Geography is a contemporary and dynamic school subject. The aims of the subject at Lancing is to introduce students to the key issues facing the planet, and to equip pupils with the knowledge and understanding they will need to make sense of, and respond to, those challenges.
At A Level Geography remains a popular subject at Lancing, as it links well with many other subjects. Students follow the OCR course, studying challenging and relevant content. Topics include how human environments are shaped and changed in the ‘changing spaces, making places’ topic, geopolitical issues are studied in ‘power and borders’, physical landscapes are taught in the ‘coastal landscape systems’ and the nature of the global systems that sustain the planet are taught in ‘carbon and water cycles’. In the final year of study two large topics of ‘hazardous earth’ and ‘disease dilemmas’ are covered, engaging pupils with diverse ideas such as the spread of disease, with a focus on Ebola and COVID-19, as well as natural tectonic events that shape the world and cause havoc.
Learning Approach
Contemporary content is accompanied by a range of teaching methods. Students will engage with geographical knowledge through high quality teaching from subject specialists. Pupils readily visit the places they are studying either through fieldwork, or through the use of digital mapping and Earth visualisers such as Google Earth. This literally brings the world to the students in various forms!
Enrichment and fieldwork
Studies of Geography are accompanied by high quality field trips. To prepare for their A Levels, students take part in an international field trip to Barcelona, to study a variety of landscapes in a stunning location.
In addition to these compulsory trips, each year the Department offers an optional fieldtrip open to all geographers in the school. These include Iceland and Sicily.
Students receive support for their studies through a subscription to magazines, and opportunities to take part in national competitions, such as the ‘Young Geographer of the Year’ from the Royal Geographical Society. In the Sixth Form pupils are invited to the Brighton branch of the Geographical Association for a series of high quality lectures.
We also host the CLIMATE + lecture series online, with speakers on a variety of geographical topics, and students create ‘The Lancing Geographer’ journal of original articles each year.
Careers
Geographers often top the polls for the most employable graduates due to the mixture of both numerical skills and linguistic abilities. The teamwork and leadership engendered through fieldwork and the ability to ask and answer the most challenging questions facing the planet ensures a steady stream of geographers in a wide array of careers. In an increasingly globalised workplace, supported by increasingly complex technology, geographers are quite rightly at the forefront of industry.
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