Avoid 4shared!!

Apologies but many of my links to files have been erased by 4shared as I didn't log in to my account within 30 days. I missed it by one day! I asked for some reprieve but didn't get a reply.
I won't be using them as a host in future. Please bear with me whilst I re-load the lost files onto another, more reliable host.

Streuth!

Some presentations relevant to A Level from the Geography Teachers' Association of South Australia.

How to prepare for an A Level Exam

A Word document I 'borrowed' from the generous guys at the A Level Geography Room:
CLICK

Geography-related Presentation Materials

Free resources from the Hong Kong Geographical Association - some useful stuff for A Level teaching despite the Hong Kong bias:
http://www.hkga.org/
Roll over "Resource Center" for the materials

A Level Ning

Alan Parkinson has set up a useful ning to discuss the new EdExcel A level course:
http://newedexcelgeog.ning.com/
Alan says the ning is open to all to join.

A Ning is a new social networking platform - it allows you to set up an area which can be open to anyone, or closed off. Posts can have documents attached, which makes it another way to share resources for downloading for free, and photos, blogs and movies can also be added.

Mr White does Geography

A site devoted to Geography resources for GCSE and A level students

http://ramblewell.blogspot.com/

The impacts of the 2004 Asian Tsunami on Phuket

If you're looking for a case study...
Download Powerpoint

Teaching idea from Alan Parkinson

TEACHING IDEA FOR CHANGES TO CLIMATE AS A RESULT OF GLOBAL WARMING
There'll be LESS OF THIS and MORE OF THIS...

Create a powerpoint with a series of images representing changes which we are likely to see as the climate changes...

See who can produce the best set of images which show the changes that we can expect

Try to think of some intriguing changes...

For example a view of people sat inside eating round a table and others sitting around a barbeque in the garden, or at a pavement cafe.

Crop Changes

Species change

Lifestyle change

Water shortages

Temperature related change: disease / health / clothing etc...

Try to alternate the LESS and MORE slides, and have perhaps some sort of connections between them....

Here is a basic template and a starter powerpoint, with the animations which fade the words in and out on the slide... You will need to add other slides, and of course an image on each one which will be behind the text. May need to move the text, or may want to add a semi-transparent box behind the text, or change the colour of the text. Each slide is set for 10 seconds which allows time for the text to fade in and out, and the transition is for a fade through black, which I like, but which you can change....

Could also attach music to the first slide and set to play through the duration of the presentation...

Download template from here:

TEMPLATE

Think Geography

A useful AS/A2 section on this blog set up by Slemish College, a Secondary School located in Ballymena, Northern Ireland.

http://www.thinkgeography.org.uk/ASGeog.html

http://www.thinkgeography.org.uk/A2Geog.html

THE GEOGRAPHY ROOM

Worth a few visits - the blog for and by the A2 Geography students at Boston Spa School, Yorkshire, studying Edexcel B Geography.
http://www.geographyroom.blogspot.com/

Alternative clocks

Try this in your A Level lessons. Might wake them up!

Alternative clocks - set time limits for activities in fun ways:

Finish before the ice cube melts;

Finish before the slice of apple is not eatable;

Finish before the cymbal fades;

Finish before the music stops;

Finish before the match burns down (careful)

Finish before the snail makes it to the food

Etc.

Royal geographical Socirty's A Level revision conference

Took place in October 2005. Lots of useful PowerPoints and PDFs to download:
CLICK HERE

ELR/DALR/SALR made simple

Here's a PowerPoint for the taking:
CLICK HERE!

Meteorology Notes

These series of lectures by Joel Michaelsen of University College Santa Barbara provide an excellent set of notes for AS/A2 Atmosphere.

http://www.geog.ucsb.edu/~joel/g110_w07/

Variations on the Odd One Out (OOO)

I often include One Out Out (OOO) actvities at AS/A Level. Too often we stop using these after GCSE level but I find they are very useful to test learning and to iniatiate discussion in class. I would like to thank Mike Fleetham for providing me with these ideas. Mike's Thinking Classroom website can be found at:
http://www.thinkingclassroom.co.uk/
Variations on the Odd One Out (OOO):

Odd All Out – give a different reason for why each item could be the odd one out

Odd None Out – give a reason why there isn’t an odd one out

Odd One In – give a reason why the Odd One Out is more important/valuable that the others

Odd Two Out – from 5 or more items choose 2 items which are OOO for the same reason

Odd One First – use the reason for choosing the OOO to put the other items in order

Odd One More – after choosing your OOO find other items that could be too

Odd One Less – Start with 5+ items. Remove the OOO. Repeat for the remaining and so on

Marble Thinking

Great idea described by LangleyGeog, a SLN member:
'Marble Thinking' - have 21 circles and put key words in each one. The challenge is to link the 'marbles' (how long can the chain be), and describe the energy (the link between them).
http://www.learningnet.co.uk/ubb/Forum5/HTML/009190.html

OCR AS/A2 Revision website

http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/kingworc/departments/geography/revision.html

Teaching the DALR and SALR?

Nothing creative but some pdf notes for downloading.
Adiabatic pdf
Moisture & stability in the atmosphere pdf

Contributions please

This blog has attempted to pool together any new approaches/activities that teachers have developed when teaching AS/A Level (even IB Diploma) Geography. It is often the case that the traditional approach to teaching post-16 geography is too didactic and lacking in stimulation, largely due to the huge content, and unfortunately the thought-provoking activities developed at KS3 and KS4 are neglected. This blog aims to resolve this problem. But I need your help -please share your ideas (however feeble you think they are) on this blog otherwise my attempt has failed. Send any files or comments you have to me at:
pauliswi@gmail.com
Happy teaching!
Paul

Sand dune succession case study.

This site provides detailed information on the sand dunes of the Sefton coast in North West England.
http://www.sandsoftime.hope.ac.uk/succession/model.htm

Mind maps

Making a lot of use of these to reinforce knowledge at A Level. Here are 2 maps made by my Y13 students. They have been studying the topic of Tropical Environments as part of the CIE International A level Geography specification.

Teaching Urban models

Some tips from Val Vannet:
At the heart of urban models there is the concept that zones within the city have recognisably different characteristics which differentiate them one from the other.

What about giving a photograph of an urban landscape to every pupil in your class? It would depend how many you've got but supposing it's around 25, you'd prepare 5 photos of, say, five different zones and give them each one. Their task is to organise themselves into groups representing the different urban zones. It will require a fair bit of movement, a lot of looking at other people's photos and probably a lot of discussion. At AS level, when they should be bringing some knowledge of urban geography with them, I wouldn't make this too easy. A photo representing inner city redevelopment, for example, should be deliberately ambiguous. Other photos might make pupils think about land use in a historical context e.g. in which urban zones would you not expect to find a crematorium?

Once the groups have got themselves 'sorted', you could get them to check a code on the back of their photo. Who is in the wrong group? What reasons can they put forward for being there. Why did the others in that group accept them?

Could you finish by getting each group to make a display using their photos, highlighting the features of their urban zone?

ICTZ PowerPoint

Click here

Rural settlements worksheets

Thanks to Gilbert Frith for these contributions:

Social, economic and environmental change in British villages. 1st click below.

Characteristcs of rural settlements. 2nd click below.

Click1 click2

Population links for A level

Rob Chambers alerted me to this site run by the University of Southhampton:
http://www.socsci.soton.ac.uk/socstats/Population_Links/default.php?NavContext=Discipline

Techniques for teaching Nearest Neighbour Analysis

Thanks to Alan Parkinson:

‘I used the people on a beach analogy - set the mood of the seaside and give them some beach scenarios - where would you sit ? why ?
What if there was a group of lads playing frisbee ? Near or far away ?
Then give some patterns, and a step by step formula.’

A2 OCR Hazards Resources

PowerPoints and Word documents created by Matt Burdett. Can be downloaded from the "A2 Hazards" folder contained with in the "Matt Burdett" folder:
CLICK
Thanks goes to Matt for sharing.

Soil intro. notes

Know the name of this tropical soil??

Brief notes on soils here

AQA A Settlement SOW

Thanks to Helen Nurton again for this scheme of work.
Click here.

Advice on teaching the ITCZ

First from Val Vannet:
"I reckon the ITCZ is one of those topics where 'old technology' works best. You just can't beat two sheets of acetate on an OHP! Get your base map on one and draw the ITCZ and the converging air masses/winds on the other and then move it 'with the seasons'.
I usually get a climate graph for somewhere in Northern Nigeria at the ready, plot that location on my base map and as I shift the ICTZ, point out the corelation between the prevailing air mass and precipitation. This usually works!"

and from "Blue Square Thing":
"With the ITCZ I find it helps them to have a A3 sheet with 4 maps on and to be able to locate it in Dec, Mar, Jun and Sep - and then to add the Sub-Tropical High and so on - I use Africa essentially as it makes more sense later when I come back to ecoclines - and in Edexcel B I always make sure that I do grasslands rather than forests as the content doubles up nicely."

AS population and migration SOW

Thanks to Helen, who teaches at Guildford County School, for this lucid example of an AS scheme of work.
CLICK

OCN Geography & Environmental Studies - useful web sites

Hundreds of links here:
CLICK!!!

AS Links

A list of links on river landforms, Bangladesh, Corals, Holderness Coast, Sea Defences, Sea Palling, Emerging Coasts, Submerging Coasts, Salt Marshes, Dunes, Mangroves etc.
http://www.peakscan.freeuk.com/edexcel_as_coasts.htm