The Department of Geography
G
eography has continued to adapt this year to ensure students still explored a range of places and processes around the world, despite the challenging circumstances of the global pandemic. In fact, despite the periodic interruptions to usual teaching, it has managed to be a year of ‘firsts’ for the Geography Department here at St Olave’s. The academic year 2020-2021 marked the first full cycle of the new Geography KS3 curriculum, in which students investigated an even greater range of locations than ever before through the introduction of the regional geography topics on Africa, Russia, China, Indonesia and the UK, alongside important themes of Sustainability, Plate Tectonics, Glaciation, Rivers, Resources and many more. This was supplemented with the first co-curricular Castles Day for Year 7, which was organised collectively by Geography, Art and History, in place of the usual Eynsford fieldtrip. It was a resounding success, allowing students to draw on their understanding of all three subjects to decide on the perfect position and design for their castles with some impressive end results. The need to adapt fieldtrips also impacted the Sixth Form too, where Year 12 Geographers ‘virtually’ visited and conducted fieldwork at Seaford for the first time, utilising Geographical Information Systems to explore the site, find secondary data and plot information spatially due to the pandemic restricting visits at the start of the year.
Whilst these new experiences and opportunities were met with enthusiasm by the students, the return of the year 10 Urban Futures fieldtrip, in which they investigated ways of life and how they varied around Orpington, at the end of the academic year also acted as a glimmer of hope that even more year groups will have the chance to experience Geography fieldwork in-person going forward, as things slowly return to ‘normal’. In my closing statement for the Olavian, I often find myself praising the outgoing year groups who continually impress me with their dedication and diligence. However, I do feel a particular sense of pride at the achievements of the Year 13 and Year 11 Geography students this year. They have shown remarkable resilience to persist through two academic years of disrupted learning with more live lessons and cancelled exams than anyone expected. I think we can all agree that their numerous successes are thoroughly well deserved!
Rhiannon Smith Head of Geography
Rory Gee – Year 7 78 – Olavian 2021
