Curriculum Overview – Year 7
Year 7 students will start their time in Geography looking at atlas and map skills. These skills will allow students to get the most from the topics which follow and are key skills used at GCSE. Over the year students will cover a mixture of human and physical topics to give them an understanding of the world around them and also cover key content looking forward to GCSE study.
The topics covered are Hazards, specifically focusing on tectonic hazards such as volcanoes, Factulness and Development comparing levels of development around the world, coast and rivers looking at the process that shape the land and how humans impact these environments and we finish looking at where our energy comes from and how future energy needs could be met.
Curriculum Overview – Year 8
In Year 8 students will continue to build their confidence in the skills and knowledge gained in Year 7.
The topics covered in Year 8 will cover both human and physical topics to give students a good understanding of the world they live in and cover content preparing them for GCSE, should they opt into Geography.
To start the year, Year 8 students will look at the Oceans topic, focusing on the importance of our world’s oceans and then looking at the environmental damage we are creating in our oceans, they will then move on to looking at geography and health and now this links back to development elements from Y7. Term 3 will see students looking at population, focusing on population change and migration globally, and the impacts of population growth around the world. Term 4 students will look at Japan and all it has to offer and comparing it to the UK. For the final term we will look at how the world is changing and the division still present the world and what the future of the world as we know it may look like.
Curriculum Overview – Year 9
In Year 9 students have chosen to study Geography and should have a good foundation to build on over the GCSE course from having worked through the Year 7 and 8 topics.
The AQA GCSE exam is split into three papers, Paper 1 is Living in the Physical Environment, Paper 2 Challenges of the Human Environment and Paper 3 Geographical Application. Over the three years of study, students will cover a mixture of content from the three papers. The Geographical Applications paper involves skills that will be repeatedly covered throughout the topics.
Term 1 in Year 9 is The Challenge of Natural Hazards looking first at tectonic hazards where students will focus on the cause, effects and responses to earthquakes comparing an earthquake in a HIC (High Income Country) and LIC (Low Income Country).
Term 2 looks at Weather Hazards, focusing on tropical storms and then the causes of climate change, its impacts and how it could be managed looking to the future.
Term 3 is Urban Issues and Challenges where students will look at how urban areas are changing globally, looking specifically at Mumbai (LIC) and Sheffield (HIC) and the opportunities and challenges faced. They will finish by looking at urban sustainability and how urban areas could change in the future.
Term 4 and 5 The Living World required students to explore the different climate regions of the world which give us very differing ecosystems. Students will look at how the climate impacts the animals and plants within them, the people living there and the economies of different countries. Students will look in detail at the Malaysian rainforest and the Thar desert.
Curriculum Overview – Year 10
In Year 10, students will continue their study of the AQA Geography specification in preparation for their GCSE exams in Year 11. Students will focus on three key topics as detailed below:
Term 1 Physical Landscape of the UK: students will look at coasts and rivers. Here they will look at the processes of erosion, transportation and deposition. For coasts they will look at the landforms created along our coasts, finishing by looking at how coastal areas are managed, focusing specifically on the Holderness Coast. For rivers students will look at a river from source to mouth and the landforms found along the river, looking in detail at the River Tees. They finish the topic looking at flooding: the causes, management and exploring the Somerset floods as a named example.
Term 2 The Changing Economic World is the final topic in Year 10 where students will look how our world is unequal in terms of development and the reasons for this. They will look at how industrial growth can have an impact focusing on Nigeria and Shell. Students will also consider how aid, fair trade, debt relief and tourism in Jamaica, can help development.
Term 3 This term students’ will be looking at the fieldwork element of the course with Y10 completing their Human Fieldwork where they will visit Sheffield to compare the urban environment across a number of areas in the city. They will also visit Hornsea to complete their Physical Fieldwork for paper 3 looking at the success of coastal management at Hornsea. To finish the term, we look at the DME (Decision Making Exercise) and run through a practice example.
Curriculum Overview – Year 11
Year 11 will start the year looking at the final topic for paper 3: Challenge of Resource Management. In this topic, students will look at global use of resources focusing on food, energy and water. They will explore general patterns of consumption, how this impacts globally and how this can be managed. Following this they will look in detail at water as a resource with case studies from the Lesotho Highland Water Project (a large-scale water project with South Africa) and the Wakel River Project (a small-scale sustainable water supply). During the final term students will also complete their Physical Fieldwork for paper 3 looking at the success of coastal management at Hornsea.
Following this students’ will focus on revision and exam preparation with support for their teachers, using different resources to support and exam question practice making sure students understand the command words used and what they need to be putting in their answers. Students will also receive their pre-release material for paper 3 which gives us time to look at the content and prepare students for the decision-making task.
Curriculum Leader
Mrs A Riches – ariches@sbch.org.uk
Teacher of Geography
Mrs E Marshall – emarshall@sbch.org.uk
Mr M Mason – mmason@sbch.org.uk