Geography at St. Thomas More Catholic Primary School

INTENT

We ensure that through the lens of faith we develop individual, unique people and form the foundations of them being able to contribute to society.  Our school vision is that as a Catholic school, God is at the heart of all we do. We believe that each person is made in His image, deserving to be treated with respect and dignity.  Showing respect, love and care for everyone and everything, we aim to develop harmony between pupils, parents the school and Parish and grow as a Christian community. We aim to enable each individual to realise their full potential, spiritually, academically, physically, socially and emotionally.  

The Geography Curriculum ties closely with our school ethos. Our aim is for all children to become confident, creative and engaged learners who achieve their full God-given potential.  We aim to inspire curiosity and fascination about their locality and that of the wider world.  It is our hope that pupils through our Catholic Social Teaching show ‘Care for Creation’ and can learn to be change-makers, be happy and healthy, as well as inquisitive and creative. For this reason it is our ambition for our pupils to leave St Thomas More Catholic Primary School with a love of Geography which will last them a lifetime.

Our curriculum aims to ensure that children in:

Key Stage 1 (Years 1–2):

Know: Basic geographical vocabulary (e.g. beach, mountain, city, weather).
Understand: Simple maps and the concept of location (e.g. local area, UK countries).
Do: Use maps, globes, and simple fieldwork to explore their surroundings and describe places.

Lower Key Stage 2 (Years 3–4):

Know: Key physical and human features of the UK and the wider world.
Understand: How environments differ and change, including climate zones and land use.
Do: Use maps, atlases, and digital tools to locate places and present geographical information.

Upper Key Stage 2 (Years 5–6):

Know: Global geographical patterns (e.g. trade, population, natural disasters).
Understand: How human and physical processes interact to shape the world.
Do: Conduct detailed fieldwork, interpret data, and communicate findings using geographical vocabulary and tools.

IMPLEMENTATION

To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in geography at St Thomas More Catholic Primary School, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the school.  We understand the importance of substantive and disciplinary geographical concepts. All themes begin by identifying the key content and key vocabulary. Learning then will start by revisiting prior knowledge. It will be scaffolded to support children to recall previous learning and make connections. Staff will model explicitly the subject-specific vocabulary, knowledge and skills relevant to the learning to allow them to integrate new knowledge into larger concepts. 

In EYFS, geographical skills and understanding are taught through ‘Understanding the World’ and continuous provision.  In Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2, geography is taught as part of the Faithful Foundations curriculum, where learning is linked into key themes, with other foundation subjects, including literature. Geography learning has been divided into 3 sections: World study, local study and environmental study. The skills are then split into: Skills; Topics, Locational knowledge, Place knowledge, Human and Physical geography and Geographical skills and fieldwork.

Where appropriate subject lead and teachers will offer a wide range of extra-curricular activities, visits, trips and visitors to complement and broaden the curriculum, which are purposeful and link with the knowledge that will be taught in class.

IMPACT

We aim for all of our children to leave us as geographers; they should have a solid knowledge base which will stand them in good stead for future education and transition to Key Stage 3. We aim to teach them about their local area through carefully progressive units. Crucially, we will create a bespoke curriculum, which allows them to investigate Geography which is relevant to them now and importantly as adults of the future, for example through the exploration of sustainable tourism when studying contrasting localities. Pupil’s understanding in Geography will be assessed through quizzes and retrieval practise linked to the ‘sticky knowledge’, this will be supplemented with an assessment of skills using our tracking system. Through fieldwork, children will gain skills which will be useful in later life. Careful links will be made between subjects such as Science, History, Computing and Mathematics will allow children to gain a depth through other areas of learning.

Our Geography Learning 2025-2026

Our Geography learning 2024/25