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GTIP Think Piece - Human Geography (primary)
Margaret Macintosh discusses different aspects of teaching about human geography at key stages 1 and 2.
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Human geography, in national curriculum terms, includes people and places in locality studies, from school to the local area, from contrasting localities to distant places, including in less economically developed countries (LEDCs). Thematic work can include study of settlement, focusing on land-use issues and use examples from local to global.
Unlike other areas of the curriculum there is no list of human geographical knowledge/content that children must be taught.
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Children like to learn about people. They like to find out what life is like for these people (themselves and others) in this place (local or far away) now and what it might it be like in the future. This might be as a result of our actions today, often expressed as probable, possible or preferred futures. Is this human geography, or is it more?
Trainee teachers could be asked whether they agree that geography ‘provides a unique contribution to the study and understanding of the worlds of daily existence and global interdependence ... It explores the nature and features of places and environments, examines the structures, processes, interactions and patterns involved, and evaluates the issues and impacts that emerge’?
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| Interconnection – a key word |
Geography is a subject that tries to be ‘holistic’. It focuses on the interconnectedness of people and the places or environments in which they live, socialise and work or spend a holiday. The physical and the human worlds are connected, and complex issues often arise from these interactions.
The local ‘lived lives’ of people are also connected to the wider world. Experience shows that studying local, national or global issues, in contexts of interest and relevance to the pupils, provides powerful and motivating learning experiences. This is the power of geography.
Through issue-based work geographical ‘vocabulary’ (names of countries, capitals, rivers, mountains, etc.) and some of the basic ‘grammar’ of the subject (e.g. river systems, how towns and cities grow and link with each other through work, shopping and leisure patterns) can be acquired and refined.
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Key questions relating to teaching about human geography are:- What is the place of human geography in a holistic primary geography?
- How can we teach about people affecting (and managing) places or the environment?
- How can pupils learn about the environment’s effect on people’s lives?
- Should pupils be learning about how people affect the environment, or can this lead to ‘doom and gloom’? How can it be made positive?
- Do human values, beliefs and opinions have a place in primary geography? And, if so, where, how, why?
- Should we be teaching about ‘place’ as ‘occupied’ social space?
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| Place as social (occupied) space |
Does focusing on ‘place’ lead to mere morphological descriptions of built or other environments? Thinking of ‘social space’ may invite more analysis and comparison of how people use, live in, think about and interact in spaces, with the advantage of accessing sociological multiple perspectives. It often presents alternatives rather than clear-cut answers, and some are ‘better’ than others for debate. Thus, it offers a valuable experience for pupils, and an antidote for a school culture that sometimes over emphasises the ‘right answer’ with a tick.
Locality studies of ‘occupied space’
‘Place’ studies with an emphasis on ‘locality’ are essential at both key stages 1 and 2. There are many questions for trainee teachers to consider, including:- How do schools choose contrasted and LEDC localities?
- At key stage 1 do schools take the opportunity to teach about a locality in the USA, Europe or Oceania (possibly building on teachers’ own experiences)?
- At key stage 2 is there too much reliance on photopacks? Do they lead to encyclopaedic or ‘Cook’s Tour’ geography?
- Is a geography based on topical issues preferable?
Enquiries based on topical geographical or environmental issues are particularly powerful and motivating, using an issue-based question framework (see ‘Redevelopment of site in Exmouth’ below) to provide structure. Such enquiries become good studies if located in real, named places (i.e. not just an anonymous ‘rainforest’). Suitable and topical issues appear in the broadsheet press almost daily, each article usually accompanied by a colour photograph and weblinks. (See Primary Geographer, October 2003, and where the QCA Scheme of Work is used, this links with Unit 16, What’s in the news?)
As well as employing a holistic approach, working with real geographical or environmental issues develops pupils’ geographical, enquiry and thinking skills in context as they seek answers to questions. Analysis of issue-based work in national curriculum terms invariably shows that it encompasses enquiry, skills, place, patterns and process and education for sustainable development located in a relevant theme.
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| Suggestions for a PGCE session |
The idea given here (which replicates a classroom activity) illustrates a holistic, issue-based approach to primary geography in an urban settlement.
However, most of the examples I use start with a natural/physical environment and focus on human intervention in it. For example, tourism in Antarctica, diversion of two Devon rivers to extract ball clay or a planning application to build a chemical plant on a Botswana salt pan. You could use any topical human geography issue, urban or rural, local, national or global.
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| Redevelopment of specific sites in Exmouth |
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Introduce a newspaper article or television news item and seek answers to a series of issue-based questions:- What’s the issue?
- Why is it an issue?
- Where is it taking place? - use graphicacy resources to locate and ‘nest’ Exmouth and to find the specific sites within the town, which are mostly seafront and Exe estuary-side locations.
- What’s the place like? - use photographs as ‘alternative texts’, ground-level photographs of positive and less positive images of the sites/town; use postcards - why were these images taken? what’s the message/agenda?; fieldwork and/or video. Use the opportunity to discuss multiple perspectives.
- How could we get there? - transport, routes, road atlas, train/bus maps (timetables, taking us into numeracy).
- Which groups or individuals are involved? - identify interested parties, from the newspaper cutting or television clip.
- What views do they hold? - this depends on so many things including social, political, economic position, interests and experiences. Discuss whether informed guesses are sufficient at primary level. Are we after accurate information or insight into differing values and opinions leading to conflict resolution, and decision-making processes to reach consensus, linking with citizenship and democracy?
- What alternative solutions are there? - identify alternatives and evaluate from the (perceived) different perspectives of the interested parties.
- How will a decision be made? - decision-making processes in action; role play/simulation of an appropriate meeting.
- What do you feel about the issue? - expressing a personal opinion.
- What do you think the decision should be, and why? - justification.
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Plenary to PGCE session (but not the classroom activity with pupils). Analyse the activity in national curriculum terms, such as:- Enquiry - using issue-based question framework.
- Skills - range of graphicacy activities, fieldwork, ICT (e.g. access local government website for planning details).
- Place - ‘nest’ Exmouth and locate specific sites.
- Processes - development, urban change (from demand and use of facilities, and in economic value of land).
- Patterns - change in use of prime sites for economic gain.
- Environmental change - of each site.
- Sustainable development - particularly in economic terms, through social choices to use or not.
Experiencing this approach, analysing the activity and identifying the traditional human and physical geography, will help you to answer the questions posed above.
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| Bibliography and weblinks |
Allen, J. and Massey, D. (1995) Geographical Worlds. The Open University. (First of five volume series entitled The Shape of the World, which explores the ‘contribution that geography can make to our understanding of a changing world and our place within it’. If you are unfamiliar with this series, start at the beginning and get carried away as you challenge your ‘understanding of the nature of the geographical imagination’ and think how you can bring these ideas into your teaching.)
Catling, S. (2003) 'Curriculum contested: primary geography and social justice', Geography, 88, 3, pp. 164-210.
Massey, D. (1999) 'The social place', Primary Geographer, 37, pp. 4-6. (Talks about different ways of looking at the nature of a place and presents ideas new to primary geography in a hands-on way that can be taken into the primary classroom.)
Mackintosh, M. (2004) 'Talk and pictures in key stage 2 geography', Primary English Magazine,10,1, pp. 23-27. (Uses the issue-based questions in a case study of Antarctic tourism, focusing on graphicacy and oracy.)
Primary Geographer (2003) 'Focus on fragile environments', 52. (Includes several case studies and ideas for developing holistic, issue-based work.)
Scoffham, S. (2004) Primary Geography Handbook. Sheffield: Geographical Association. (Includes chapters on using the school locality, contrasting localities, the wider world, geography and the global dimension, and settlement.)
Weblinks
Geographical Association - to subscribe to Primary Geographer, and access it and other online information and resources for primary geography.
Valuing Places - for information, ideas and innovative approaches from the project which focuses on development education.
Global Dimension - ideas can be adapted for use in primary schools.
Global Eye - issues of the geographical magazine Global Eye which contain country (not locality) case studies, and comment on current issues.
QCA website - National Curriculum in Action’ and Innovating with Geography’ include examples of children’s work
Staffordshire Learning Net Geography - for superb, up-to-the-minute information, examples, ideas and everything geographical, especially ‘Geo-Primary’.
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Newton, L. & Newton, D. (2006) 'To what extent can children's geography books help a primary school teacher explain cause and purpose?' IRGEE, 15, 1, 29-40. Abstract
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(Updated 26.03.07)
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