Geography is essentially about seeing and understanding the world we live in. At Cleeve Meadow School our intent, when teaching geography, is to inspire in our students’ a sense of curiosity about themselves and the world; its wonders, mystery and dangers.

Our curriculum has been designed to encourage students to develop a greater knowledge and understanding of the interconnections between physical and human landscapes and the processes that change them. We aim to nurture an appreciation of diversity acknowledging the legitimacy of other cultures, ideas and values whilst maintaining empathy and self-awareness.

In KS3 students will explore both, physical and human geography topics, including tectonic hazards, weather and climate, as well as issues and challenges of urbanisation and economic development. Students’ understanding of places and processes will be applied to real case study examples at different scales and locations and a fieldwork enquiry.

We aim to equip our students with a range of transferable geographical skills (map skills, graphical skills, numerical and statistical skills). Students will develop enquiry skills such as hypothesis building, questionnaire design, field work and data collection. They will also be encouraged to develop their questioning, investigation and critical thinking skills.

The Geography curriculum at Cleeve Meadow School has been planned to ensure the grounding knowledge and skills from KS3 provides strong foundations to accomplish entry level qualifications in KS4.

Students will be working towards an OCR Entry Level 2 and 3 Certificate in Geography.

The course will encourage students to:

• further develop the knowledge of locations, places and environments and of different scales (know geographical material)

• broaden the understanding of the connections between people and environments, and change in places over time (think like a geographer)

• practise a range of skills including those used in fieldwork (study like a geographer)

• apply geographical knowledge and understanding to real world contexts, including fieldwork

To achieve the OCR’s Entry Level Certificate students must complete all three tasks which make up 100% of the assessment.