Teacher Geographer Leader Educator
Merry Chrsitmas to you all! I wish everyone a lovely Christmas and New Year. The photograph above is of myself at a recent Santa Run for the British Heart Foundation – brilliant fun! I hope everyone gets what thay want this Christmas and more!! Anyway, back to making snowmen and eating mince pies…
The bad weather we seem to have experienced this month doesn’t seem to be stopping. What with the disruption to the economy, it has caused wide-spread problems with people travelling. I can express my own personal disappointment as I was due to fly to Rome for a few days prior to Christmas – in the end my flights were cancelled like thousands of others. Britain’s two main airports, Heathrow and Gatwick, are still having major problems with the snow. I just hope they all get back for Christmas.
With the recent snow it reminds me of when I started writing my blog back in January with the snow back then. Please let us know what the weather situation is like with you. From the weather reports it is not just Britain but mainland Europe too. It looks like it will be around till Boxing Day.
With Christmas fast approaching and the cold snowy evenings I thought I would briefly outline two very important events appearing on miketidd.com over the next two weeks.
On Christmas Day will be my first Christmas message to all you educators out there on the blogosphere – read my yuletide message and enjoy a glass of wine at the same time!
Plus on 31st December my end of the year round up – looking at year as a whole focusing on what has been successful and the areas that need to be developed. See you there!
Having just returned from Barcelona I am catching up on the news and I was delighted to see Geography Teachers gaining praise by Prince Andrew. This has come out due to the recent WikiLeaks. Geography has been always been something of a Royal subject with Prince William having recently studying the subject at St. Andrew’s University. For the full report please follow the link here. Just out of interest, does that mean I have a chance of being Knighted?
This year I have had the chance to organise the A’Level field trip to Barcelona. I have organised many field trips over the years but this was my first overseas trip. At Gillingham School the Geography Department have been going to Barcelona for the last twelve years with much success. Initially it was quite daunting planning a trip overseas but I have had much help and guidance for which I am especially grateful for – thank you team!
For our A’Level the students are requested to undertake several days fieldwork which they are assessed for in January as part of an examination. Our focus for the trip was rebranding and extreme weather. Going to Barcelona lets us complete all these topics and at a much cheaper cost compared to the UK. We also complete our fieldwork with the Barcelona Field Studies Centre who are very experienced team of geographers run by Derek Geary.
Day one consists of an orientation tour of Barcelona city and a pre-fieldwork session outling the field trip.
Day two is primarily the extreme weather day focusing on flash flooding at the River Ribes.
Day three is the rural rebranding day in the Priorat region of Spain looking at the success of the wine industry.
Day Four is the urban rebranding day in El Raval looking at the success of the flagship development projects.
After each day the students work extremely hard on looking at and evaluating their methods, results and conclusions. Well done and thank you to everyone involved – you were all brilliant!
On a recent visit to London I met up with our very own Prime Minister to hand in the ‘Tidd Report’.
This month the Humanities Department at my school, Gillingham School, are growing moustaches in aid of ‘Movember’. Movember challenges men to change their facial appearance and the face of men’s health by growing a moustache. The rules are very simple, grow a moustache for 30 days and raise funds. The funds raised are given to The Prostrate Cancer Charity, the UK’s leading prostrate cancer charity. Last year over £26 million was raised. If you would like to donate please follow this link here, Gillingham Humanities Crew, all money raised is greatly received. I will of course put a picture up of my moustache at the end of the 30 days! Thank you to you all who donate!!
We have just finished completing our controlled assessment in geography to mixed reviews. Have other schools felt the same?
As a department we have a very successful record of doing well across all types of learners and is something as teachers we are proud of. Like any job/role this has taking a lot of time and effort to put in place. But I recently felt from completing the controlled assessment that it is stretching the higher ability students and maybe not so helpful or beneficial for the less able students. Whereas before you could push and motivate a C/D student to gain a C, now with the examination high level control they get a D. The higher ability students though have really enjoyed the expereince. With a busy stressful year, many of our Year 11 students have not enjoyed their experience due to the following factors:
I would like to hear other schools’ experiences of the controlled assessment. Is it working in your centre? I am sure with time the experience will be more positive, but it does not feel like the experience we were first told about.
A new exhibition to illustrate London’s landmarks in an environment transformed by climate change, is being held at the Museum of London. The photographs have been digitally changed by illustrators Robert Graves and Didier Madoc-Jones. The display shows the full impact of global warning, food scarcity, rising sea levels and how people will need to survive and adapt for the future. The exhibition is running from now till March 2011.
Isn’t globalisation brilliant…
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