Curriculum Making
Primary Handbook Extension Project - Maps and Stories (8-11)
Mapping Landscapes
This page extends the content of Primary Geography Handbook Chapter 8
Mapwork skills
by Colin Bridge (pp.105-119)
‘ Our overall objectives are that we want our pupils to learn how to describe where they are and record information in their local environment, to be able to plan routes and journeys, to extend this ability from the locality to the rest of the UK and to make sense of the daily bombardment of media messages... ...Mapwork is made more exciting nowadays through the use of aerial photos, satellite images, internet searches and an expanding range of interactive computer programmes...' Bridge (2004) p.105
It is not until you start to provide opportunities for structured observation and discussion of local areas that pupils realise they may have trodden the same routes every day and yet not really noticed what was beneath their feet and around them. In this respect it's always useful to find out what pupils think they know about a locality before visiting it and what they think after structured fieldwork. Sharing different perceptions of the same place can also be extremely enlightening as we tend to hold differing views and personal connotations of places which relate to our own prior experiences and use.
Pupils will probably have little knowledge of the geology underpinning different landscapes and Stig of the Dump offers accessible ways to develop their thinking.
Talk Curriculum Making
Discussions: 2