Geography at Sea View
The purpose of study
A high-quality geography education should inspire in pupils a curiosity and fascination about the world and its people that will remain with them for the rest of their lives. Teaching should equip pupils with knowledge about diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. As pupils progress, their growing knowledge about the world should help them to deepen their understanding of the interaction between physical and human processes, and of the formation and use of landscapes and environments. Geographical knowledge, understanding and skills provide the frameworks and approaches that explain how the Earth’s features at different scales are shaped, interconnected and change over time.
Meet Greta Geography.
Greta is part of our Curriculum Crew who is introduced at the start of each topic and lesson, providing a visual link to lessons and allows our children to focus on the skills needed in the upcoming tasks.
Greta is featured as part of our Geography Pathway Journey - allowing the children to revisit and consolidate prior learning .
Aims
- The national curriculum for geography aims to ensure that all pupils:
- develop contextual knowledge of the location of globally significant places – both terrestrial and marine – including their defining physical and human characteristics and how these provide a geographical context for understanding the actions of processes
- understand the processes that give rise to key physical and human geographical features of the world, how these are interdependent and how they bring about spatial variation and change over time
- are competent in the geographical skills needed to:
- collect, analyse and communicate with a range of data gathered through experiences of fieldwork that deepen their understanding of geographical processes
- interpret a range of sources of geographical information, including maps, diagrams, globes, aerial photographs and Geographical Information Systems (GIS)
- communicate geographical information in a variety of ways, including through maps, numerical and quantitative skills and writing at length.
2023 - 2024
Nursery
We have been exploring our outdoor environment on our Autumn walk. We followed the path, looking for signs of the changing season, from Summer into Autumn. We followed along the edges of the shrubs and trees and travelled through a secret path, following Mrs Henderson, where we went under branches and up and over a hill.
We read the story 'Naughty bus' and talked about his journey through town and past landmarks. We used real maps of our local area, looking carefully at different streets and drew where we thought our houses and school might be. We also drew symbols to signify places that we are familiar with. We also built towns using our construction resources.
Reception
We have been reading the story 'What the Ladybird Heard' by Julia Donaldson. To help our learning we have created our own maps of farms including what animals are in the story. We have learned that maps tell you where things are and can help you go different places.
As part of our 'Amazing Animals' topic we have been looking at tigers. As a group we looked at our own country in the UK then at where tigers live in Asia on Google Earth. As an independent task the we explored this on the interactive whiteboard and were even challenged to find England and China! Some of us were supported in finding where our school is in England.
Year 1
In geography this term we have started to look at our school and our local area.
We have used this opportunity to get outdoors and complete fieldwork activities. The children went for a walk around our school yard and spotted a lot of human features. We then used a range of resources to create a messy map to map out our journey. The children used directional language to describe the location of each feature.
Year 1 have started to look at the geography around them. We have started looking at our school grounds. We looked at an aerial photograph and identified the key features.
We enjoyed using Google Earth to explore our school and the local area and the children were able to label features around us.
We have also talked about different countries that children have travelled to and looked at how far away they are from us.
Year 2
In Geography, during Spring term, we have been exploring our local town. We sorted human and physical features and thought about those that belong to our town. We used maps to locate our school and local landmarks and planned a coastal walk from school. To finish our topic we went on the planned walk and sketched the landmarks we saw along the coast.
Year 3
First we used electronic maps on the ipads to locate Stone Age settlements in Britain. We had a lot of fun using the atlas to locate places in the UK by following the grid references. We used our skills to locate the Stone Age settlement of Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands. We then found out all about the weather, the homes and the crops on Skara Brae and how they survived on this landscape and why a settlement was located here. Just for fun, at the end of our lesson, we used our new map reading skills to locate some pirate treasure!
Year 4
As part of our Romans topic, we researched the Roman roads. We used maps to help us to locate and label the Roman roads.
Year 5
The River Tyne - from source to mouth.
Using Digi maps we used the Geograph tool to track the journey of the River Tyne from source to mouth. We identified the human and physical features and discussed the impact human activity has on the river and the surrounding environment.
Year 5
Women in History.
Amelia Earhart.
With the guidance of Amelia Earhart we investigated and learnt about the difference between longitude and latitude. We tracked her amazing journeys and adventures around the world on her record breaking attempts.
Exploring the Human and Physical Landscape of Scotland.
When Hal reluctantly accompanies his Uncle Nat on the final journey of the Highland Falcon, an iconic royal steam train, he is anticipating a dull, uneventful trip .
As the train wends its way from London to Scotland, some priceless jewellery goes missing. Realising the thief must be on the train, Hal and Lenny decide to investigate, piecing together clues to try to identify the culprit.
Inspired by our class novel we explored the changing and varied landscape of Scotland.
Year 6
Capital Cities of North & Central America
We researched and explored the capital cities of North and Central America including their population, area, geographical features, landmarks and culture. We then compared the size of their population and area with each other.
2022-2023
Nursery
We drew our family and talked about who lives in our house.
We like to build different structures and play with the small world toys.
Hansel and Gretel map-making
We talked about the journey that Hansel and Gretel might have taken through the forest and about different landmarks that they might have passed on the way.
We created the journey in the outdoor area using props
We made maps by sequencing the story pictures and drawing our own maps with landmarks in small group time.
Reception
We loved recreating the journey the robbers planned to take from our story "What the Ladybird heard" by Julia Donaldson.
We read the story of the Jolly Postman and talked about his journey to deliver the letters. He had a very busy job delivering letters to the fairy-tale characters. We then made our own maps and talked about the route he took.
We have been learning to draw a soundscape. A soundscape is about listening to the sounds around us and how we can draw them. We sat in the garden with our eyes closed to listen to the noises. Then we opened our eyes to draw the soundmap. We could hear an aeroplane, children playing, the waves at the beach and birds in the sky.
Year 1
As part of National Fieldwork Fortnight we walked to the beach and completed a traffic survey. The children used a tally chart to record the types of vehicles we seen near to the beach and once back at school we analysed the data and talked about how this data might be different in contrasting areas.
In geography this term we have started to look at our school and our local area.
We have used this opportunity to get outdoors and complete fieldwork activities. We took a walk around our school grounds and identified and took photos of human features. When we got back to the classroom, we used these photos to create a messy map of our school grounds.
To help us understand North, East, South and West we took the children for a walk to our coastline. On the way we spotted a range of human and physical features. We found a spot to stop and used our compasses to to see what we could see in each direction. The children had so much fun!
We drew pictures of the human and physical features we could see in each direction.
Year 2
South Shields
We have been learning all about our home town. We have looked at globes and located the United Kingdom; naming the 4 countries and surrounding seas. We used aerial maps to navigate around our school and completed an orienteering course to locate given points.
Geographical and Human Features
When learning about our town we looked at the geographical (natural) and human (man-made) features of the environment and sorted them using venn and carrol diagrams.
Aerial Mapping
We used Google Earth and aerial maps to locate landmarks along out coast. We then located our school and planned a route to follow for our upcoming visit to the coast.
Year 3
We have been developing our map skills by locating continents, oceans and rainforests as part of our exploration into the Amazon rainforest this term.
In Year 3 we have been using electronic maps to research and locate Stone Age historical sites and places of interest.
Year 4
Natural Disasters
We are thoroughly enjoying our topic, Natural Disasters. We began by creating top trump cards to show our understanding of a range of different natural disasters and gave them our own terror rating!
We also looked at the structure of the earth and the tectonic plates to explain the causes of some natural disasters.
Year 5
Explorers.
Our exciting topic of Explorers has so far taken us on an exciting journey around the magnificent mountain ranges around the world. We have already identified the worlds key mountain ranges, studied the key features of mountains as well as researching a mountain of our choice.
Women in History.
Amelia Earhart.
With the guidance of Amelia Earhart we investigated and learnt about the difference between longitude and latitude. We tracked her amazing journies and adventures around the world on her record breaking attempts.
Year 6
As part of Comparing People and Places topic, we explored the glorious Grand Canyon. We researched interesting facts about the Grand Canyon and how it was formed as well as created a poster about a chosen animal from the desert scrub biome.
2021-2022
Nursery
In the Early Years Foundation stage at Sea View the children begin to develop their geographical knowledge by exploring features of our school and nursery. Maps and atlases are used to investigate different places as we begin to compare and contrast different environments. Children have rich opportunities to make use of school grounds to enhance and apply their skills as geographers. Throughout the year, children observe and discuss the weather and seasonal changes. Children also learn about the different jobs which people do in our community
Occupations
Seasons
Making maps
Reception
We had a special visitor from NUSTEM to help us discover more about the weather and seasons. We shared the story, ‘the Little Cloud’, and talked about different types of weather. Following the story we made our own wind socks to put in our outside environment, windmills and sun catchers.
We had a great time learning about the season of Autumn. We talked about the different things we might see during Autumn. We then went for an Autumn walk around the school grounds to find signs of Autumn. We collected Autumn leaves, acorns and berries to make an Autumn display in our classroom.
We have been learning to draw a map for the story Jack and the Beanstalk and sequence a story map of events .
Year One
We have been learning about the United Kingdom and the local area in which we live.
We explored the terms human and physical features
Year Two
We have been learning about our local area this term. We have learned about the human and physical features of our town, as well as using map skills to locate the important features.
We visited lots of the important features during our coastal walk! We had so much fun exploring our local area.
Year Three
Temperate vs Tropical!
We have loved our topic exploring the rainforest of Brazil this year. As part of the topic, we explored the similarities and differences between temperate rainforests and tropical rainforests.
Year Four
During Spring term in Year 4 we have been looking at the causes, locations and the effects of different natural disasters including: hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanoes and tsunamis. We have been locating different countries using an atlas and exploring the physical features of the landscape. We learned about the different layers that make up the Earth and how these often cause or impact natural disasters.
Year Five
Explorers!
As Geography Explorers we have enjoyed investigating mountains, rivers and our coast.
Through our topic we have climbed the dizzy heights of mountains around the world, created a guide for climbing Everest, created contour models, took a digi-map tour of the River Tyne and explored the different features of coasts.
Mountains Around the World
Mountain Features
Contours
The Mighty Everest
Year Six
Comparing People and Places
As part of Comparing People and Places topic, we explored the glorious Grand Canyon. We researched interesting facts about the Grand Canyon and how it was formed, created a poster about a chosen animal from the desert scrub biome as well as investigating the various tribes.
Researching the Grand Canyon
Researching and identifying species that live in the Desert Scrub Biome
Meet the Tribes of the Grand Canyon
