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Geographical imaginations

1.1 Place

  1. Understanding the physical and human characteristics of real places.

  2. Developing ‘geographical imaginations’ of places.

Taken from here.

Just got back from a short ride on the MTB and avoiding packing away the tents for next weekend. The clip above will form a lesson idea designed to explore Year 7's geographical imaginations.

Place as the National Curriculum sees it looks like this:





From this it is clear that pupils should explore different places and interpret their imaginations of place as well as other peoples. Essentially, exploring places. But how can we communicate geographical imaginations?

The youtube video is one of my favorite parts of Cool Runnings. I like this as it links to the Olympics and one of the main characters says something that I very strongly believe in: 'I didn't come all this way to forget who I am and where I come from'. How would we like to remember Portsmouth if we moved away? What images will we remember in 10 years time?

Below is a lesson idea that I will be working up this weekend. It will form the opening 2/3 lessons of the new Year 7 Places unit. What are you doing to explore geographical imaginations?

The lesson:

Show clip of Cool Runnings.



The main quote is at the end of the clip above. Spider diagram / mind map - what tells us where this team is from? Feedback.

Link to my own personal geography - Welshman away from Wales. Explore my geographical imagination - show Welsh stuff e.g. my mug and rugby shirt.


I will also show a Photostory of Welsh images accompanied by 'Bread of Heaven' and the national anthem



This is how pupils will present their geographical imagination of Portsmouth: as a photostory animation accompanied by music. To get across the effect of music I will show images from Portsmouth. Shown on a PowerPoint slide. Then 5 different tunes, e.g. The Enemy, We live and die in these times; something really RnB, something classical, .... Pupils will record how they feel and a vote/discussion about the most appropriate musical choice will take place. (hopefully using a class voting / discussion system where pupils send their vote and a justification displayed on the board)

Ideally the lesson will then head out into Portsmouth to collect images, film and ideas. Failing that I will provide pupils with a range of music and images of the city. Pupils could also collect information for homework and include quote from themselves, family and friends.

The outcome will be a series of Photostories uploaded onto the school VLE or blog. Pupils will have to justify their choice of images and music. This could be done as a 'Dragons Den' style presentation: the scenario - you have been asked to produce a TV advert for Portsmouth....

I want to follow up the idea by producing a film based on Matt's travels:



Pupils will produce a video like this but in Portsmouth - we'll see about this part though!
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