OCR C has a ‘focus on environmental issues and sustainability … underpinned by the study of places and themes through an enquiry approach’. It is also the only GCSE Geography specification with staged assessment.
My Place
Sections b, c, and d of Theme 4, ‘Population and Settlement’, are firmly fixed at the local scale, while much of the first-hand fieldwork tends to focus on the ‘Questions for enquiry’ especially in section c. You could easily access ‘My place’ through this part of the OCR C specification. Further opportunities also exist to bring in the bigger UK picture as well as a link with the EU and beyond through the ‘Population’ section. Theme 5 ‘Sustainable Development’ provides the content for the decision making exercise assessment based on pre-released material. However, most of section c ‘Resolving Issues’ would be relevant to the first sections of ‘My place’ and is often used in candidates’ local coursework topics. Certainly the concepts of interdependence, uneven development and futures can all be explored here. Many of the ideas developed on Royston in the Teachers’ Resource Guide (pages 17-23) could be taught through OCR’s Population and Settlement theme.
An Extreme Environment
An extreme environment focuses on ‘the study of landscape, the study of physical processes and an exploration of human adaptations and responses’. Theme 1 in the OCR C specification, ‘Physical Systems and Environments’, contains much of the content covered by the ‘An extreme environment’ theme. The prescribed places are mainly the UK or EU - if the latter is chosen, the High Alps are an appropriate environment. Choosing these mountains would be a good starter for the debate about views on what constitutes such an environment. Most of 1a, part of 1b and the second half of 1c could be taught through this example with a selected Alpine Valley being used as ‘a smaller example of the landscape’. Further opportunities to explore extreme environments as a vehicle for delivering this specification could be drawn out of Theme 2 ‘Natural Hazards and People’ if the Sahara Desert was chosen. Turn to pages 25-28 in the Teachers’ Resource Guide for an exemplar on the Arctic Ocean and Svalbard Islands.
Alternatively, you can access the Resources section via the navigation bar on the left or visit Unlocking the Archives, where you will find ‘Antarctica’, another example of an extreme environment.
People as Consumers
‘People as consumers’ mainly draws on Theme 3 ‘Economic Activity’ with scope for using the content and enquiry questions of the Pilot GCSE’s theme to look at the ‘spatial impact of a particular product and a named service’. Section c of OCR C ‘International disparities, trade and interdependence’ provides an opportunity to explore the concepts of globalisation and uneven development as well as the ethics of consumption. Theme 5 (sections b and c) provide opportunities to consider resource issues and address some of the enquiry questions in the first section such as ‘What are the spatial consequences of these decisions?’ The Teachers’ Resource Guide has a worked example of how this theme might be approached (pages 29-39).
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PIlot GCSE: Links to OCR C 1988
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