Geographical Association

Participant reports from 2006/07 are available below and 2005/06 reports are available here.

Mark Smith and Steve Dunn give a very clear explanation of how using GIS with handheld PDAs for local fieldwork has real advantages over paper based approaches. Data is collected and analysed more quickly, more accurately and pupils know they are using the same techniques as GIS professionals.

Tom Biebrach considers his own experience as well as a range of literature to ask what impact has GIS had on geographical education in secondary schools? He considers areas including motivation, geographical enquiry and the ability of pupils to identify patterns to draw geographical meaning from data. He also considers the barriers to developing GIS and ways forward.

Kathryn Morrell, in her Masters Dissertation, gives an overview of the use of GIS in England and considers the barriers which have caused such a low use, how these might be overcome and what may be the benefits of using GIS.

Kathryn then went on to assess the practicality of online GIS viewers with her pupils. She gives examples from the classroom including a geographical enquiry into social factors effecting crime, through a spatial approach. She points out a grasp of scale, better spatial litearcy and spatial awareness through using GIS.

Sergio Matias tells his story of how GIS can be introduced when moving to a new department. The motivational impact of Google Earth (GE) is clear. He shows how GE reached pupils' personal geographies; looking for 'my house' and letting pupils take control with GE to tell their life story through space and place. He also finds the spatial angle useful in tackling controversial issues like migration by throwing new light on old questions and to challenge pupils' preconceptions, such as ethnic distributions in Luton.

Steve Kitson explains how he overcame technical issues in getting GIS started in schools through Google Earth. He found pupils took to the technology easily, once it was working.

Sarah Cowling and Louise Ellis at Icknield school used web-based GIS viewers in a decision-making task, taking the role of estate agent finding suitable property locations for customers. They found pupils took easily to the technology, and were able to evaluate their use of GIS.

Neil Lobo from Vyners School has introduced GIS into his department's curriculum. He found that a department INSET session was the important catalyst for this.

Bob Grinham and Caroline Hone from Nobel School, Herts, found their students were able to use a wide range of data, deepening their enquiry focused on spatial patterns, when they used Digital Worlds GIS to follow up fieldwork at the London 2012 Olympics site.