GlosGeog, Gloucestershire’s local Geographical Association (GA) branch, felt that it should act as a role model and lead the way with a fieldwork activity to mark #NationalFestivalofFieldwork during the month of June. The following opportunity was offered FREE to schools, whether they were Geographical Association (GA)/GlosGeog members or not and located in and beyond Gloucestershire, to promote inclusivity and accessibility within geography. Today saw 10 schools and around 700 Key Stage 2 pupils and their teachers join us from all over England for an action-packed couple of hours.
Following a formal welcome, introductions and outlining housekeeping/protocols, I handed over to Daniel Raven-Ellison, Guerilla Geographer, Founder and CEO of Slow Ways, Founder of National Park Cities and a National Geographic Explorer, as well as a former secondary school teacher for many years.
Firstly, Dan emphasised that we are all explorers, with the power to use geography to help us gain a greater understanding of places and our lives, plus improve them. He reinforced that exploration is all about asking questions and searching for answers.
To set the scene, Dan explained how satellites are used to observe land from space and shared some stunning NASA images of Earth’s landforms to show how cameras can reveal patterns and details we might otherwise miss.
Such data can be amalgamated to create a land use map. However, it can be difficult for our brains to grasp just how much of Earth’s surface is used in different ways when it is spread across a complex map.
Dan provided a quick explanation of what percentages mean, then introduced his idea of showing land use visually through 100-metre and 100-second walks, where each metre (or second) represents 1% of Earth’s land use. He even related this to everyday items, such as pizza and cake, to help youngsters grasp the concept.
The team behind his latest film was introduced, including the drone that was employed to help capture this concept.
Dan then invited the audience to guess how much land is utilised for different purposes. Teachers gathered figures from the children and added them to the chat feed. There were some very interesting guesses!
Next, Dan played his new short film, ‘Earth in 100 seconds‘, proudly announcing that the voiceover was done by his 21 year old son (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MshXmxjEQnc).
Afterwards, he revealed the answers to the earlier questions that he had posed to his audience; in some instances, we were a long way off! Dan then led an open discussion, drawing on aspects shown in the film and asking the children what surprised them the most.
It was now time to ‘take learning beyond the classroom‘. We challenged the children to a fieldwork ‘mission’ that they had to complete over the next 45 minutes. Teachers had been briefed about this in a preliminary discussion meeting, so were well prepared with worksheets and maps at the ready. The youngsters had to imagine that they were pigeons, flying over their local area. They had to go out and explore, identifying at least one place where they thought that there should be a change to the land use, think about what they would like it to be changed to and consider why this should be the case. At the site of proposed change, pupils were challenged to annotate a local OS map generated using Digimap for Schools (DfS) (https://digimapforschools.edina.ac.uk/) and fill in a worksheet.
On their return, we zoomed into each classroom and asked one or two representatives to communicate their findings to the wider audience. We had many willing volunteers, which was lovely to see. It was clear that this activity had opened their eyes to what was around them. There were several very impressive field sketches too.
I then set pupils a follow-up task (see below), which we hope will also promote future activism and advocacy in school.
The morning concluded with us gathering pupil and staff voice via the chat feed. Both youngsters and teachers were asked to sum up today’s session in five words or a sentence or two, plus identify what went well (WWW) and even better if (EBI). A collection of their responses can be seen below:
Pupil voice
Sum up today’s session in five words or a sentence or two:
Exploring nature; fun.
Observed, wrote and drew.
Nature; habitats; food sources; improve; change.
Interesting; entertaining; fun; made me think; noticed things; educational.
Everyone can be explorers, activists and environment protectors.
What Went Well (WWW):
Being outside; changing areas.
Being explorers; making a difference; enquiry; helping biodiversity.
Fun; enjoyable.
Found out about the Earth’s purpose and features.
Getting outside; drawing; connecting with other schools.
Everything!
Fun exploring different parts of our village.
Even Better If (EBI):
More time.
A little more time outside.
Could take a whole day.
More time and a way of comparing other schools in maybe more urban areas than ourselves.
More time to go outside and explore.
I’d like to do it, imagining I was a hedgehog. (Dan)
Staff voice:
Thank you for a fantastic morning.
The video was amazing – very eye-opening. We will be talking about this all week.
Thank you so much for today!
We enjoyed it so much! Thanks so much again!
Thank you so much for including us in the fieldwork event. My class thoroughly enjoyed it and other classes are taking the idea and doing it too. I’ve attached a few pictures and samples, but if you need any more just say as they all completed everything. The children loved the day and so did I and the TAs who came out with me. We’ve definitely agreed to get out around our local area a lot more and carry out fieldwork activities. Thank you for inspiring us.Â
All in all, an enjoyable and reflective morning, it seems. Moreover, the weather stayed dry for us.
Well done to all those involved. We look forward to receiving photographs of the children in action and their follow-up work in the next day or so. The best ones will be selected to appear in an article that both Dan and I have been asked to write for the Geographical Association (GA)’s Primary Geography journal.
