David Rogers

Unconsolidated muds below Naish Holiday Village. As part of the department's plan to expand fieldwork opportunities I ventured to Barton on Sea and Hurst Castle Spit last week. The plan is to take Year 10's in order to investigate the interaction between people and physical landforms. I had hoped to upload some photos of the visit however Blogger seems to be playing up at the moment! Old chalet slabs on the cliff top. Naish Holiday Village We have chosen two sites to investigate. The first is at Highcliffe beach. This provides a classic coastal management case study where the effect of managed retreat can be seen under the Naish Holiday Park. This site also forms the boundary between two counties and councils. The second site will be Hurst Castle Spit. I feel it's very important to link any visit into the classroom both before and after. Therefore we shall be switching our coastal management case study from Lulworth Cove to Hurst Castle Spit. The visit will also be follow...

Last Friday myself a few staff and 13 Year 10 students journeyed to Talybont on Usk and the Danywenallt study centre. The trip was a trial to see how a larger fieldtrip would work out. I have to say that the weekend was a great success and I would reconmend using the centre.

This picture shows the amount of erosion around the Danywenallt study centre. I think this is due to a large amount of the forest surrounding Talybont Reservoir being cleared and increasing the amount of surface runoff. A great way to explain river processes to young people in the field! Nothing beats seeing Geography in action.

The Saturday was spent examining the Geography of the local area around Talybont on Usk. I have to thank all of those involved: Ron from the Brecon Beacons National Park eductaion service and all those at Big Pit . After a huge breakfast (another thank you to the staff at Danywenallt ) the group tackled a 4km walk tracing the industrial history of the valley. This included the impact of tourism - for example one of the local villages has only 9 residents due to the effect of second homes. Pupils investigated the site of the old water wheel, the uses of the canal and also explored access and conservation issues. We visited Big Pit after lunch and the students saw the contrast between the agricultural and industrial valleys. A huge thank you to Pete the guide who really made the tour enjoyable.

This happened a couple of weeks ago now but I'm only just getting around to writing about it. March usually means it's time for the Year 7 trip to Sparsholt Agricultural College. The School's Centre there has been providing a day of activity for Year 7 for some years now to our students. We are still the only department that manages to get the whole of a year group out - although over 5 days! The focus of the visit changed this year. Instead of focusing on farming systems participants tried to see how the centre is sustainable. This will allow the students to plan their own enquiry into how sustainable our own school is. The day was a great success (I only went along on one trip this year) and the sun shined for once! One interesting point that came out of the day was that the solar panel on the schools' centre is connected to the National Grid: providing a small amount of power! I hope that the Year 7 environment unit will expand to allow them to make real changes to ...