Geography

I have been teaching geography for almost ten years and have a wealth of experience in leadership, management and curriculum development. My affable and personable nature has generated many positive working, professional relationships with the people I have been fortunate enough to work with and this is something I am keen to develop further in my role as SLE.

I began teaching geography at Monk’s Walk School in Welwyn Garden City in 2009 and moved on to become head of department for four years, where I was responsible for the growth, development and popularity of the subject across the school. I have experience of overseeing the implementation of new lessons, resources, schemes of work and assessment practices with the new linear A Level, revised GCSE specifications and ‘Life after Levels’ at Key Stage 3. I have developed effective strategies for leading and managing a team of professionals to help deliver this.

I moved to the Priory School in 2017 as a lead practitioner where I have been responsible for delivering numerous CPD training sessions to staff, observing lessons and providing feedback as well as creating resources to support those students who have been removed from lessons. I am currently in the process of developing links with local primary schools to support the provision of geography in Key Stage 1 and 2.

My areas of pedagogical interest involve encouraging students to be more independent learners and how we as staff can facilitate this within, and outside, the classroom. I am particularly keen to look at the role of homework and how this can facilitate learning as well as the use of differentiation to enable the progress of all students in their learning. I am a strong believer in unity within the workplace and some of the most effective tools at our disposal are those around us. Therefore I am a keen advocate of sharing best practice in order to develop our own teaching practice further.

Emma qualified to teach in 2005 and took up an NQT position at Hitchin Girls' School. Appointed as Head of Department in her second year teaching she succeeded in leading the department through significant growth in Geography numbers as well as three specification changes.

The department holds the Geographical Association's Secondary Geography Quality Mark with Centre of Excellence Status. She is a member of the Geographical Association's Secondary Phase Committee and an NQT Consultant on the Geography Team for Hertfordshire.

In addition, she is a mentor for both The University of Cambridge (where she on the mentor panel) and University College London PGCE programmes. Emma is particularly interested in the design and provision of a high quality Geography curriculum and is constantly evolving her practice to take advantage of simple but effective approaches to pedagogy.

I have 10 years’ experience as Head of Geography at Hitchin Boys' which has afforded me the chance to experience a wide range of opportunities and challenges that I believe have improved my management and leadership experience. Just like all subject leaders I am currently working towards ensuring a smooth transition to the new specifications at GCSE and A-level and have a number of new strategies in place to help the department maintain our excellent results.

I believe in having a culture of encouraging ideas to flourish and for staff to try new teaching and learning styles both within the classroom and for assessment. This has helped all members of the department take on additional teaching and learning responsibilities including myself so allowing the department to keep moving forward. I am also currently a Head of Year in the sixth form and prior to this I was Head of Initial Teacher Training responsible for new staff induction, PGCEs and NQTs between 2008 and 2012.

Outside of the classroom I have led numerous trips to Iceland, China, the Lake District and Dorset as well as attending many others. The next big adventure is planning and leading a multi-curriculum trip to China for 10 days with 81 students to hopefully enhance experiences for art, photography, music, business and of course geography.

I have delivered multiple CPD sessions not only at Hitchin Boys' School but also across the Hitchin consortium. I am currently leading a project across the three Hitchin secondary schools to support subject leaders to quality assure their of marking of this summer’s Year 12 mocks.