The Geographical Association

Primary

Geography

Local area

The UK and regions

Europe and regions

Americas and regions

Climate and weather

Water and rivers

Mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes

Land use and settlement

Economic activity

Natural resources

Earth geometry

Human processes

Physical processes

Diversity

Sustainability

Interconnection

This unit provides a foundation for 'Local area: Where do we live?', which extends geographical investigation to the immediate locality, and for 'Local area: routes and maps' which investigates a specific land use, play areas. It lays the foundation for fieldwork investigations in the local area in 'Local area: how is our place special?' and a contrasting non-European locality.

Local area: where do we live?

This unit builds on explorations of the local area in EYFS,  focusing on the school site as a place. It develops basic geographical vocabulary and simple mapwork and fieldwork skills.

Our school

Our school from above

Our school in ten photos

Jobs in our school

Describing locations 

Fieldwork: Autumn in the school grounds

Local area: where do we go to school?

This unit provides a foundation for 'Local area: Routes and maps', which focuses on investigating a specific land use - play areas. It lays the foundation for subsequent fieldwork investigations in the local area in 'Local area: how is (our place) special?', and a contrasting non-European locality.

Local area: how do we read maps and plan routes?

This unit builds on 'Local area: Where do we go to school?', which focuses on the school site as a place, by extending the area of investigation into the local area. It develops basic geographical vocabulary and simple mapwork and fieldwork skills, focusing on human geographical features such as local buildings, land use and  journeys.

Our homes

Our local area

The street outside our school

Buildings and features near our school

A survey of how we get to school 

Mapping our journey to school

This unit builds basic knowledge needed to engage with the next unit 'Seasons' where pupils will need to talk about the world and some knowledge of its basic geometry.

Seasons: how does the weather change through the year?

This unit builds on pupils' knowledge of the world from their experiences in EYFS and their perceptions from other media and first hand experiences and expands their view of the local area as studied in 'Local area: Where do we go to school?' and 'Local area: Where do we live?' to a global scale.

Earth view: using globes and satellite images

Mapping the world: locating the continents

The world's five oceans

Mountains and rivers

Earth and the seasons

Our wonderful world and its landmarks

The UK's place in the world

Continents and oceans: what can we find out about the world?

This unit links to understanding what the UK is like and how seasonal weather is a part of this; it links directly to 'Cold places: What is it like at the North and South Poles?'  and 'Hot places: Where are they and what are they like?'. 

The UK: what kind of place is it?

This unit builds on what has been learnt in 'Local area: Where do we go to school?' and 'Local area: Where do we live?', which look at the local area and involve some weather investigation as well as noticing seasonal change, and on 'Continents and oceans', which introduces some formal earth geometry, the idea of the Earth rotating and orbiting around the sun.

Weather

Measuring the weather

Seasons

Weather and the seasons: spring

Weather and the seasons: summer

Weather and the seasons: autumn

Weather and the seasons: winter

This unit provides a foundation for 'Local to global: Identifying special places' and subsequent fieldwork investigations in 'Local area: how is our place special?' and a contrasting non-European locality in 'Contrasting locality: What is it like to live in (location) Jamaica/ Tanzania?'.

Local to global: how can we identify special places?

This unit builds on explorations of the local area in EYFS, and on 'Local area: Where do we live?' and 'Local area: Where do we go to school?'. It extends work on the school and immediate locality through investigating a specific land use - play areas. It develops basic geographical vocabulary and simple mapwork and fieldwork skills.

Locating places in our school grounds

Mapping our school grounds

Planning a route

Fieldwork: Observing geographical features on our route

Making a map of our route

Improving our school grounds

This unit provides a foundation for investigations of the UK and London or Cardiff, and further investigation of what is special in the local area.

Local area: why is (our place) special?

This unit builds on investigations of play areas in the local area, extending work on pupils’ preferred play areas and immediate locality by focusing on why some places are special.  It develops basic geographical vocabulary and simple mapwork and fieldwork skills.

Annotating our map of the school grounds

Describing and locating our favourite places 

The seven wonders of the natural world 

Human wonders of the world

This unit links to 'Life in a capital city: London/Cardiff', in which a capital city of the UK is explored as a significant place in our country.

Life in a capital city: London/Cardiff

The unit extends understanding about the local area and the characteristics and features of place explored in units 'Local area: Where do we go to school?', 'Local area: Where do we live?', 'Seasons: How does the weather change through the year?' and 'Local area: Routes and maps where we play' to a national scale.

The UK and its surrounding seas

The countries and capital cities of the UK

Geographical features in Scotland

Geographical features in England

Geographical features in Wales

Geographical features in Northern Ireland

This unit supports pupils' enquiry about the uniqueness of place when they investigate their own locality through fieldwork in 'Local area: Why is (our place) special?' and compare this with a locality overseas in 'Contrasting locality: what is it like to live in Jamaica?'.

This unit deepens pupils' understanding of the UK in 'The UK: What kind of place is it?' by zooming in to explore its capital city, London, and how it is linked to other parts of the UK and the wider world.

What is life like in Cardiff?

What is life like in London?

It then leads on to examine this same scale but by investigating hot places in 'Hot places: What is it like near the Equator?'. This unit also links to future understanding of land use and settlement, and builds on Earth Geometry by establishing familiarity with the Polar Circles here and with the Equator in 'Hot places: What is it like near the Equator?'.

Hot places: where are they and what are they like?

links to work done in and around the school ground on weather and develops the idea of temperature variations and extreme cold on a global scale. 

The world's cold places

Locating the North and South Poles

The North Pole and the Arctic

The South Pole and the Antarctic

Arctic wildlife

Antarctic wildlife

Living in the Arctic

Living in the Antarctic

Cold places: what is it like at the North and South Poles?

This unit links to 'Contrasting locality: What is it like to live in (location in) in Jamaica?', as pupils draw on their knowledge of places that are hot and wet, and also to 'The water cycle: why does it matter?'. Pupils apply their beginning thinking about locational differences in rainfall and temperature.

Contrasting locality: what is it like to live in Jamaica/Tanzania?

This unit builds on 'Cold places: What is it like at the North and South Poles?', which pupils should have done first. Pupils draw on their knowledge of cold areas of the world to help them consider the location of hot places and what they are like, making comparisons. 

The world's hottest places

Tropical places

Hot deserts

Living in the hot places of the world

This unit is a foundation for the more abstract contrasting locality units, enabling pupils to build on their understanding of the uniqueness of place through other cultural lenses and apply the learnt process of enquiry when finding out about places and people.

This builds on the Local to global unit which explored the local area and what made places special to enable pupils to be selective and communicate the most essential elements of their place in the form of a local area guide.

Locating our place with an address and directions

Key features of our local area

Mapping places to visit in our local area

The weather where I live and in the UK

Local and national landmarks

Fieldwork: our locality

This unit provides a foundation for 'Europe: How diverse are its landscapes and places' and 'Europe: What is it like to live in northern Italy', which further extend pupils’ knowledge and understanding of distant places and how to investigate them at continental and regional scales.

Europe: how diverse are its landscapes and places?

This unit builds on 'The UK: What kind of place is is?' and 'Local area: Why is (our place) special', extending and deepening pupils’ place knowledge and understanding through the study of Jamaica and a specific small Jamaican locality. It develops geographical vocabulary and skills, enabling pupils to identify similarities and differences.

What is it like to live in Jamaica?

What is it like to live in Tanzania?

The idea of land use is developed in more depth in 'Settlements: Where do people live and why?' where pupils will look at settlement patterns and make links between human and physical landscapes.

Settlements: where do people live and why?

This unit builds on 'Local area: Why is (our place) special?' and other previous locality studies to develop pupils' ideas of features and the patterns of land use in the local area, and more widely in the UK, consolidating and developing what was learnt about the UK in 'The UK: What kind of place is is?'.

UK human and physical features

Land use in the locality

Farming in the UK

Different types of land use in the UK

Using grid references to identify land use

Changing land use

Land use: how diverse are local and UK landscapes?

Links to 'Rivers: What, where and how?' where knowledge of the water cycle can be applied, and to 'Climate zones: What are they and why do they matter?', where the distribution of rainfall can be used along with temperature to understand global patterns.

Rivers: what's special about them? 

Links to 'Cold places: What is it like at the North and South Poles?' and 'Hot places: What is it like near the Equator?', and to work on weather and distribution of rainfall and temperature.

The water cycle

Water flow around the school

Water around the world

Water supply and demand in the UK

Water ownership

Water inequalities

The water cycle: why is it important? 

This unit links to 'Climate zones: What are they and why do they matter?' in which the influence of climate on global geographies and environmental regions is developed with reference to understanding of the water cycle and rivers.

Climate zones: what are they and why do they matter?

This unit builds on 'The water cycle: why is it important?' and develops this understanding further to investigate where water goes to and to look at where and why the major rivers are located and how local rivers are affected by weather variations. 

Introducing rivers

River processes and landforms

The river's journey

Flooding rivers

Flooding impacts and solutions

Rivers in the UK

Rivers in Europe

Mighty rivers of the world

This unit directly links to settlement, understanding connections between climate and where people live. This also underpins understanding needed in 'The Americas: How diverse are its places and landscapes?', 'South America: Why does the Amazon matter?', 'Natural resources: what are they, where are they and why are they important?' and 'Farms and factories: Where does our food come from?'.

This unit builds on learning about the water cycle to develop understanding of the spatial patterns of water and energy. It also builds on 'Cold places: What is it like at the North and South Poles?' and 'Hot places: What is it like near the Equator?'. It develops on 'Contrasting locality: What is it like to live in (named location) in Jamaica?') by introducing the major lines of latitude.

Introducing climate

Using lines of latitude to locate the main climate zones

Climate data and patterns

The difference between climate zones and biomes

Biomes: The interdependence of plants and animals

Climate changes

This unit provides a foundation for Local area: How is it changing?', which involves a detailed case study of change in the school’s local area, and 'UK region: Why is the Lake District a National Park?', which investigates settlements, land use and change at a regional scale. 

Local area: how is it changing?

This builds on 'Land use: how diverse are local and UK landscapes?', which focuses on land use locally and in the UK as a key aspect of human geography, extending and deepening pupils' understanding of human geography processes by investigating the characteristics of different types of settlement and the reasons why settlements are initially established and then change over time.

Settlement features

Villages, towns and cities in the UK

Location and growth of settlements

Change in our local area

Our local town

Designing a new settlement

This unit links to further work on the UK in 'The UK: Who are we?'. 'UK region: Why is the Lake District a National Park?' and particularly to fieldwork in 'Local area: What needs changing?' where pupils will return to the theme of local change and consider what changes they would like to see in the future and gather a range of perspectives on this before making recommendations. 

Local area: what needs changing?

This unit directly builds on work in 'Settlements: Where do people live and why?' to examine change in your local area through a large scale investigation, using mapwork and other evidence, including fieldwork.

Our changing place

Measuring settlement change

Recording local views

Evidence from fieldwork

Mapping changes

Measuring change in a day

This unit enables pupils to challenge the single story and think about the complexity of people and place in the study of the Lake District and in Europe ('Europe: How diverse are its landscapes and places?'). 

UK region: why is the Lake District a national park?

This builds on pupils' knowledge of the UK in 'Land use: How diverse are local and UK landscapes?' and settlements in 'Settlements: Where do people live and why?' to look outwards and make connections with the diversity of the people of the UK and the wider world. 

Regions and counties of the UK

Images of the UK

Where people live in the UK

The UK: Moving in, moving out

The impacts of the UK's changing population

Revealing the UK's global links

The UK: who are we? 

This unit provides a foundation for 'UK region: Why is the Lake District a National Park?', which investigates the physical and human geography of the Lake District as a UK mountainous region, and 'Earthquakes: How do they change the world?', which focuses on earthquakes and their impact. 

This unit builds on 'Rivers: What. where and how?', which focuses on rivers as a key aspect of physical geography. This unit extends and deepens pupils’ understanding of physical geography processes by investigating the basic structure of Planet Earth, the location and key features of major mountain ranges and volcanoes, how they change, and their significance for people’s lives.

The formation of mountains

Mountains and their features

The UK's peaks

Volcanoes and their features

Living near volcanoes

The impact of eruptions: Eyjafjallajökull, Iceland 

Mountains and volcanoes: what, where and why?

This unit provides a foundation for understanding, and making comparisons with, a region of Northern Italy, which also boasts mountains and lakes.

Europe: what is it like to live in northern Italy? 

This unit builds on 'The UK: Who are we?' and 'Mountains and volcanoes: What, where and why?' to give pupils the contextual understanding to engage with this regional study of the Lake District, its landscape and its identity as a National Park.

Subject

School phase

KS1 & KS2 Geography

Overview

Curriculum explainer

Subject principles

Our curriculum partner