Geography and the Global Dimension - Update

Two years have passed since we began our project and we have now begun our face to face dissemination phase in Sheffield.  Those of us involved in the project have had a wonderful experience.  Our project teachers enthusiasm has been great and they've come back with lots of stories of the ways their own children's critical and creative thinking has been engaged.  We now have a separate Website/ Blog where we share ideas and resources.

http://geographygoesglobal.wordpress.com/  

A great place to start would be with Zoe's account of teaching about Chembakolli, where her Year 3 children took the example of the Adivasi people's activism as a motivational starting point to change themselves and their own attitudes and behaviour in school - so their reaction certainly wasn't, ` Those poor people - what can we do for them?' but rather, `The Adivasi changed things in their lives - what can we change in ours?'

Alternatively you might want to check out:

Year 1:  Africa: Your School, My School

Year 3:  Local & Global (Zambia)

Year 3:  Chembakolli

Year 5:  Water, water everywhere

Year 5: Mountains

Year 6: The World on Your Feet

Geography and the Global Dimension

We start the second year of this DfID funded project tomorrow at Wortley Hall, South Yorkshire.  You'll find links to the PowerPoints that I'll be using over the weekend in the Slideshare banner to the right of this post.  An online CPD unit and the outcomes from this project will be appearing on the Geographical Association website from December to July.

Celebrating 5 years of the Primary Geography Quality Mark

Nine primary schools from across thse country came to Sheffield on Wednesday 16th February to help us to celebrate the PGQM fifth birthday.  This is the first time that we've held an event that involved children from different primary schools and the day was hugely successful.  The children behaved in such a mature way in our out of school environment and many of them said how good it had been to meet and work with children from different schools.  I think it will be a day they remember for a long time.  The youngest children were Year 2's (6 years old) while the oldest were eleven.  Teachers and children worked together in different workshops which included: `Philosophy for Children (P4C), investigating chocolate and the Cote d'Ivoire and creating route maps on the back of T-Shirts.  Our workshops were led by Anthony from St Peter's Smithills Dean Primary, Bolton; Arthur, Matthew and Laura from Liverpool Hope University and Ann, a freelance writer in education and P4C facilitator in Sheffield.

To find out more about the Primary Geography Quality Mark please go to http://www.geography.org.uk/eyprimary/primaryqualitymark/

Blipfoto: reading and creating photo journals

I realise that I've been rather negligent of this blog since June and I'd just like to say that it's not all down to my new obsession with `Blipfoto'.  I really have been very busy and when I get a few more minutes I'll share some of the ideas linked to my new project: Geography and the Global Dimension.

However - I have become a little obsessed with this photo-blogging or photo-journaling website since a friend told me about it.  There are several things that appeal to me about the website: first it keeps me in touch with a friend who now lives in Spain and we can share some of the things that interest us (I know many people use Facebook to do this but I quite like the different `tone' of  Blipfoto), second I can keep my own journal which I hope to be able to look back to in future years and third MOST IMPORTANT from my point of view is that I can read the journals and look at the images of people who live in and beyond the UK.  Doreen Massey (OU Emeritus Professor of Geography) said something like `Space' is the meeting point of a thousand stories and Blipfoto certainly is that.  One of my favourite journals is written by HPX who lives in New Zealand.  It has felt  quite a privilege to read her journal entries about the latest New Zealand earthquake and to gain a sense of how the earthquake has affected her and the people of Christchurch and district.  I hadn't realised how long and how frequent the aftershocks of an earthquake can be.  It has been a real eye-opener for me to read her entries and see the way she weaves in the normality of everyday life with the constant terrifying threat of what the next `rattler' might bring.

I also love the story of `Brian the Snail' - why not follow his adventures for the rest of the week. I think this very simple tellingof a photo-story is something that we could use with children.

Where's the path

Many thanks to teacher advisers in Stockport for showing me this website.  This is a fantastic site if you want to compare a map and aerial view.  View `Where's the path' >>>

Mountain views taken in Banff - Using Microsoft Photosynth

Mike McSharry has recently returned from a holiday in Banff, Canada and had put together this great shot using the FREE software from Microsoft called Photosynth.



 You can find out more about how to do this on his blog: http://mikemcsharry.com/2009/11/12/leicestershire-photosynths/

Primary History & Geography National Conference in Manchester - 15th June 2010

The GA (Geographical Association) and HA (Historical Association) ran a very successful primary conference in Manchester yesterday.  Photographs from two of the geography sessions (which was held at The Hive in Lever Street) can be accessed by clicking on the photograph.  You are welcome to download photographs from my Picasa page (I know some people in the afternoon event were interested in obtaining photographs of the mapping activity to use with their students).  I will be updating my PowerPoint presentation and making this available shortly.