GeographyPaul

I first met Paul Turner in 2010ish (I think) when he was completing his PGCE at Homerton College, Cambridge University and I was speaking to that year's cohort, as I have done for nearly 10 years now.

Our paths have crossed numerous times since: as a speaker at the GA Cambridge branch which he helped with, at Sevenoaks School when I spoke to the local cluster of teachers, and at Bedales School, where I have the privilege to be the geography moderator for their Bedales Assessed Course. Paul and I were also the two people who received the RGS-IBG's Innovative Geography Teacher awards the last time they were offered. Paul worked with a colleague from CASA UCL to create some resources.

Paul was also behind the 'Geographical Times' - I have a rare copy of Issue 1 (all reasonable offers considered) - and also cycled LEJOG and set up a drone video channel. He was also kind enough to come and speak at the GIS Day that I organised at my school earlier this year as part of the GI Learner project.

Paul has now made thousands of his resources available in a new format. There are a few geography teachers who have shared all their work over the years - I did it myself from 2001 onwards on the late great GeographyPages, and some like Richard Allaway did too with the essential Geography all the Way, but then monetised their site with a small annual subscription fee (if I could have worked out how to do it I would have done too, to be fair...)

Paul is asking for £20 for a year's subscription giving access to all the materials on his Google Drive, however the money will then be donated to Surfers against Sewage.

I've seen, and used, a fair few of Paul's resources over the years (there are some samples on the website) and have no doubt this is excellent value for money for those wanting an injection of new materials at this time of great curriculum change.
Follow, or contact him on Twitter: @geography_paul

New Digimap for Schools resources

There is a whole new set of resources now available to download to accompany the Digimap for Schools tool.

They have been written by Will Tuft, and although they are written with the Scottish Curriculum for Excellence in mind, they would be useful for anybody teaching the relevant topics.

If you want to hear more of Will's work, you can hear him being interviewed by John Johnston on the EduTalk Radio podcast website.
He is talking about his ideas for the immersive classroom. This involves an element of storytelling, suspension of disbelief, and setting up the classroom around a particular scenario.  It was interesting to hear that I got a mention near the start of the programme, when Will describes how Russel Tarr and Matt Podbury's lessons based on my Ice Man book were the inspiration for the work. Will be seeing Russel and Matt next week at Practical Pedagogies (of which more to come on the blog over the next week or so...)

Check out Will's blog here too, for some of his ideas.

New GA CPD Course - on in November

For a period between 2007 and 2013, I ran regular courses for the Geographical Association, including the Living Geography courses, NQT Conferences, GIS courses with ESRI, New Fieldwork courses and plenty of others. In that time, I worked with hundreds of teachers, and learned a lot about my own practice.
When I returned to teaching full time in 2013, I didn't have time to do them, and stopped, and a 'new' generation of presenters has taken over including Catherine Owen, Ben Ballin, Garry Simmons and Becky Kitchen.

Now, I'm back leading an event for the GA, with a new course, which has the added advantage of being 'my old favourite price': FREE. So you can come along for an afternoon discussing technology and global learning, and networking with other colleagues, and leaving with some new ideas for you I hope.

It's being put on in Bury St. Edmunds, so it's a handy location for those in Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and S. Norfolk, and perhaps even parts of Essex.

It's on the theme of the GLOBAL LEARNING PROGRAMME, (which is funding the course) and has the context of a global village.

It also connects with an online course which I wrote last year for the GA, and is called Exploring our GLOBAL VILLAGE.

There is a connection with the golden record that NASA attached to the Voyager spaceships before they headed out to the edge of the universe. I was interested in a recent Kickstarter project to create replicas.

I hope to see some of you there...

Primary Geography article

I have an article in the most recent issue of Primary Geography journal.


Steve Rawlinson asked me to write about digital connections, and ideas from my current school.


Thanks to colleagues including Martin Bramley and Richard Whymark for their thoughts, which were included in the final piece.
It can be downloaded by subscribers, and physical copies are on their way too.


You can add a subscription to your membership easily too.