Intent

At St Mary’s, we encourage the pupils to explore and make sense of the wider world with an emphasis on geographical knowledge and skills whilst inspiring them with a sense of curiosity and fascination about the world and its communities through rich and exciting topics.

Implementation

Our pupil’s geographical learning starts with the familiar and slowly builds outwards, from Bentworth, to the UK, to Europe, and across the continent further afield. Their understanding of how their local area fits into the wider world is therefore gradually accrued. All pupils have the opportunity to gain a greater understating of the 7 continents of the world, through our rich curriculum. On their journey throughout the school, they will have the opportunity to focus on each of the seven continents in greater depth, exploring physical and human features, map work and cultural differences. Subject specific vocabulary is planned for and links are made across subjects and within topics the children choose. We have created a two-year cycle for Ash (Y2/3) and Lime (Y4/5) to ensure we have a breadth and depth of knowledge being acquired across the continents and countries studied.  

Impact

When pupils leave the school, their learning in geography will have equipped them with knowledge and skills to understand diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. As they progress, their growing wisdom about the world will have helped them to deepen their understanding of the interaction between physical and human processes, and of the formation and use of landscapes and environments as well as an increased passion of our role and responsibility in caring for our planet in the hope of preserving it. Geographical knowledge, understanding and skills that our pupils learn over their time at St Mary’s provides the framework and approaches that help to explain how the Earth’s features are shaped, interconnected and change over time.