Developing a grid style approach to curriculum planning

Characteristics Teaching in years 7, 8 and 9 is divided into 18 different topics Each topic is visited once during the course of study at key stage 3 The individual units and how they follow on from one another form the structure for the delivery of your key stage 3 geography course The key is to order the units in such a way as to make increasing demands of students as a result of the increasing complexity of the unit content

The process Choose units which are relevant to your school and your students. The most effective way to do this is through departmental discussion and consultation with students Creative titles for units will give you flexibility and scope to fit them to your students’ needs. You will also find it easier to build in topicality Ordering the units to support learning from the beginning of Y7 to the end of Y9 is crucial. Units need to be ordered to allow students to use their existing knowledge, understanding and skills as well as supporting progression Once the structure is in place, schemes of work can be written for each of the units, taking each year group in turn As this approach involves teaching individual units, it is important that connections are made within and between units, especially regarding the key concepts and processes. It is also vital that during the planning process, provision is made throughout the key stage for students to practice, revisit and improve their use of geographical skills

Is this the most effective planning model for us? Some questions for the department to consider Will structuring the geography curriculum into individual units allow us to teach the content we want to? Do we have some existing resources that could be developed to fit into this planning model? How would our students benefit from learning geography using this model? Does this model have the flexibility to cater for our students’ needs? Does this model have the flexibility we need to build in topicality? Do we think this is an effective method to implement the new curriculum changes?