Living geography

What’s the story?

‘Geography is … not just about knowing about places themselves, but understanding the interdependence and connectivity of places. It is about empowering tomorrow’s adults to develop real global understanding and global citizenship so that they have the intellectual understanding to participate individually and collectively in shaping the world around them.

Bell, D (2005) ‘The value and importance of geography’. Primary Geographer, Spring 2005, p.5.

`Living geography’ is a term introduced by the Geographical Association to describe geography that is brought to life for children living in the 21st century.

Concerned with children’s lives, their futures, their world

It builds on an understanding of children’s `everyday geographies’ and helps to enhance geographical imagination and thinking

Is about change – recognises that the past helps to explain the present, but is also current and futures oriented

Has a scale `zoom lens’ – so that local is set in a global context

Is `deeply observant’ – it looks beneath the surface to identify mechanisms that change environments and societies

Encourages a critical understanding of big ideas like `sustainable development’, `interdependence’ and `globalisation’

... And helps us to make connections with the wider world.

On your own or with your colleagues as part of your staff professional development meeting:• Walk around the locality of the school. If possible

walk through a residential area, your station, local supermarket or visit your farm shop, the newsagents, your local tip, a recreation area etc., taking digital photos that link in some way to the statements on the `Living Geography’ slide. How many connections can you find?

• Buy a copy of the local newspaper – does it provide any additional ideas or identify `issues’ that might be of local concern.

Ask staff to present their ideas as `a messy map’ or perhaps an interactive presentation.

Identity: Who am I? Where do I come from? Who is my family? What is my story? Who are the people around me? Where do they come from? What is their ‘story’?

Place in the world: Where do I live? How does it look? How do I feel about it? How is it changing? How do I want it to change?

The Physical world: What is the world (and this place) made of? Why do things move? What becomes of things?

The Human world: Who decides on who gets what, and why? What is fair? How do we handle differences of opinion?

Questions adapted from Gardner & Boix-Mansilla (2006) by David Lambert

Identity: Who am I? Where do I come

from? Who is my family? What is my ‘story’? Who are the people

around me? Where do they

come from? What is their ‘story’?

Our identity is shaped by the geography that is all around us

My place in the world: Where do I live? How does it look? How do I feel about

it? Y5 Methodist J & I, Wakefield

http://www.quikmaps.com/full/47961

Living Geography: Is `deeply observant’ – it looks beneath the surface to identify mechanisms that change environments and societies

How is it changing? Why?

How do I want it to change? Who can help us make those changes?

Oyster Park Junior School, Castleford

http://www.gowilder.org.uk/Oyster-Park/index.htm

Similarities & Difference What have we got that they lack? What have they got that we lack? What do we share?

Adapted from John Fine, Nuffield Primary History

http://maps.google.co.uk/?mid=1285401571

Living geography – is Living geography – is concerned with the wider concerned with the wider

`human world’ `human world’

This is Silvapura village where the boys on the bikes go to school. The use of online mapping can help to make distant places accessible to children.

Who decides on who gets what, and why? What is fair?

How do we handle differences of opinion?

Out of the cost of this exorbitantly priced bar of chocolate , how much does the grower receive?

Fair Trade and Chocolate: http://www.papapaa.org/

Todosnuestrosmuertos on Flickr– shared via Creative Commons

What geographical What geographical questions might you questions might you

ask?ask?

Photograph taken in Chile Photograph taken in Chile following the earthquake on following the earthquake on 28.02.1028.02.10

What connects us to this What connects us to this image?image?

This is the beachwhere the flip flops comeat the end of theirflip flop trip.

And where does aflip flop trip begin?

the floor of a flip flop factory;on the shelf of a flip flop shop;or the foot of a flip flop fan?

Read the rest of this poem on Espeth Murray’s website

http://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story.html

The danger of the single story

If you do nothing else please watch this video.

Building on the previous activity – take one of the ideas that emerged from your `living geography’ photo-walk and try and plan a sequence of learning activities that link the local to the global. Use the key questions which were introduced earlier in this presentation. • Were the questions useful?• Did you find that certain questions were more

appropriate for different age groups?