At Priory, our aim is that children will develop knowledge that will last a lifetime, along with strong skills to prepare them for the world, enabling them to lead a successful life and make a positive contribution to their community.
Our children are provided with a well taught, knowledge rich curriculum. The basis of this is full implementation of the National Curriculum ensuring breadth, balance and clear progression. Our expectations are high for all pupils: we never narrow our curriculum or deny any pupils the key knowledge taught to the class, unless it is absolutely in their best interest due to a significant learning need.
We carefully consider our children and community to ensure our curriculum is bespoke to their needs. Any purchased schemes are also carefully considered and adjusted to match need. As a Rights Respecting School, where possible in lessons, links are made to the rights of the child. Opportunities to promote British Values, SMSC and our equality objectives are incorporated across the Curriculum. Teachers have strong subject knowledge and learning is clearly sequenced over terms, years and throughout the school to ensure knowledge is learnt and embedded.
Skills & Fieldwork
Geographical skills and fieldwork are key parts of the children becoming geographers! They don’t just learn about geography – they do the things that geographers do! This includes:
- Using maps, globes and atlases
- Giving and following compass directions
- Working with data and statistics
- Taking part in fieldwork activities to observe, measure and record
Cross Curricular links to Geography
The skills and knowledge the children use in Geography complement those in the rest of the curriculum. These are just some of the ways that Geography links to other areas of their study:
Children use their drawing skills to produce different kinds of maps in a variety of scales.
1:1 iPads allow children to explore geographical information through access to ‘Digimaps’, ‘Google Earth’, etc.
Children encounter statistics, produce charts and graphs, use directional language and use scale (maps).
Just like in RE, children are encouraged to thoughtfully and critically think about the world in which they live in. Looking after the environment and sustainability are two big geographical issues that face humanity today that link with spirituality.
Comprehension Crushers units focus on key geographical topics taught throughout the school (current year group and previous year groups to reignite learning).
Children are used to making observations and recording data in their science lessons. These skills are reinforced through fieldwork in Geography.
Children produce pieces of extended writing about the geographical texts and concepts studied.