This week, Year 8 will mostly be exploring...

Click to download the 2018 Transparency report as a PDF

Welcome to Daisy - a replacement for LIAM

We've been looking at E-Waste, and the role of Agbobloshie....
Previously there was Liam



Here's a story from earlier this week about Daisy, which can dismantle 200 iPhones an hour.
Our question was, what happens to Liam now? Do we need some robots to dismantle him?



Image: Apple

We like this idea... Try it out Y10s

Impressive time lapse costal landforms from year 10 today 👍 #geography @Preston_School pic.twitter.com/eEstv0hz4Y

— Andrew (@mrcullingford06) April 19, 2018

Sponsor Miss Kyndt for Sunday's London Marathon

If you want to get fully involved in supporting the London Marathon this Sunday, and want to sponsor a runner, can I recommend Miss Kyndt.
Go here to donate to Claire.

Claire will also be running in the Uganda Marathon in June, our main King's Ely Junior fund raising choice.

London Marathon - if you have a few spare pennies (or pounds) send them to Miss K https://t.co/Rcrsy1lPeq

— KingsElyGeographers (@KingsElyGeog) April 19, 2018

Mr. P at the GA Conference

Can you spot him here, as part of the volunteers who help the work of the Geographical Association?

Today is #VolunteerRecognitionDay and we'd like to say a big THANK YOU to all the people who work tirelessly to help with the GA's mission to further geographical knowledge and understanding through education #WeAreGeography pic.twitter.com/Rsq73zeLym

— Geographical Assoc (@The_GA) April 20, 2018

Fashion Revolution week is next week....

We will be taking part in this event as we have done for the last five years.

A guide to taking part can be downloaded as a PDF by following this link.

Heading for Geneva

These are anxious times for the residents of Cape Town. They have been counting down to Day Zero: the day when the taps were due to be turned off, and they would have to rely on standpipes and rationing of water. There has been a drought for three years in this area of the Eastern Cape, and most of the major sources of water have been depleted, or are at very low levels.
Channel 4 news had a number of reports on the crisis, which in January had set the date of April for Day Zero to arrive.

Thanks to a lot of efforts by residents to cut down on their water since then, and this has now been put back to later in the year, and possibly now into 2019 if current usage levels are maintained.

There will be a focus on this story for my workshops in Geneva on Saturday.
July was previously the date when the water was predicted

I will be sharing all the work from my workshop at the ECOLINT IB conference, which has been organised by Richard Allaway here, during and after the event itself.

The Cape Town City Council website is a very useful place to go for further information, as they provide guidance for residents and visitors on how to reduce their water usage.

An interactive by National Geographic has been featured here before, and here's the link.

I shall also be using some ideas from our rather fine Mission:Explore WATER resource which some of you may not be familiar with. This includes some of Tom MJ's wonderful inkings. It's 78 pages long, and the 5Mb PDF can be yours to download by clicking here.

Thanks to Jo Payne for sharing some work she had done, and also to Ben Hennig for consultation over some maps. Also, though not linked to Cape Town, check out the WATER DIARIES resources on Jordan for more watery inspiration.


Illustration copyright: Tom Morgan-Jones

Guy's rants

Thanks to Simon Renshaw for directing me towards the website of Guy Watson.

Guy is the owner of Riverford Organics, so obviously has an interest in promoting his own approach to farming, and has had time to develop and build his business to the point where it is now.

A series of his 'rants' can be found on YouTube, and some of them would make useful provocations or introductions to thinking about agriculture. I haven't watched them all, so can't guarantee the odd bit of (organic) fruity language...

Iceland and Palm Oil

The supermarket not the country...

BREAKING NEWS: We're the UK's first supermarket to commit to removing #palmoil from our own label products by the end of this year! Watch here to find out why...#PalmOilAlarmCall pic.twitter.com/hfGvH2QRDW

— Iceland Foods ❄️ (@IcelandFoods) April 10, 2018

125 top Geotips from Mr. Parkinson

For the 125 days leading up to the conference, as part of the #125GA celebrations, there was a daily tweet offering a Top Tip for Geographers, with a tag #125geotips. These were on all sorts of geographical themes.
Thanks to the tens of thousands of people who read them and responded to them over on Twitter, but for those who don't use Twitter, here's all 125 collated for you. The hyperlink will take you through to the original tweet with all the relevant images and links to the resources.

125 Top Tips for the Geographical Association’s 125th Anniversary Celebrations by GeoBlogs on Scribd

GA Conference 2018 - Mr. P and Mrs M attending...

One of the things that happened over the Easter holiday was the GA Conference.

This featured a workshop of the GI Learner project that the school is involved in.

Mr. Parkinson was involved in the workshop at the conference sharing some of the outcomes from our GI Learner ERASMUS project. Thanks to those who came along to the workshop.

Here's Karl Donert and Luc Zwartjes finalising things...


Check out the materials here.

There is a final meeting for the project in Ghent in June, and as part of that we are presenting some of the work, and working with teachers who attend the event.

This will include a grant for those teachers who want to come along, and for teachers in the UK, and other countries outside of Belgium, there is a grant of €150 for attending, which should pay for transport and accommodation, as it's a 1 day event, so manageable from London in a single day for example, given the good train connection and the link with Eurostar.
Teachers are asked to pay €50 to secure a place, and once they attend the event, they will receive a payment of €150.

There are 20 grants available, and these are available on a first come, first served basis....

See the details below for what you need to do if you want to join me in Ghent in June.

Final conference Ghent from GeoBlogs

Image: Alan Parkinson

Snowdonia 'A' level fieldwork

I'm currently on another trip - this time to Snowdonia with 6th form students, and colleagues, to do the fieldwork for upland and lowland glaciation. It is not on the doorstep when you live in Cambridgeshire, so we will be exploring upland and lowland areas, in the area around Cwm Idwal, the Ogwen Valley and Nant Ffrancon.

After a night at the Swallow Falls Youth Hostel, we've arrived at Rhyd-y-Creuau, and just back from an upland glacial day in and around Cwm Idwal.

I mentioned the BritIce map, as a possible secondary source.

Hemsby Erosion....

‘I had nine metres of garden five hours ago - now it’s gone’ - residents tell of horror as stormy seas batter coastal village https://t.co/jckDKj2Hro

— Eastern Daily Press (@EDP24) March 17, 2018

Better World Detectives

Tui is the travel company formerly known as Thomson. 
They have made available a suite of resources for KS2 pupils, which involves 6 fully resourced lessons. There is an accent on sustainability, which connects with the company's approach of promoting sustainable tourism.

An e-mail is required to download the resource pack, which runs to almost 300Mb as it includes a range of assets including videos and teacher resources to print off. These are fun, and well packaged materials, with nods to social media use, and themes which will be familiar to many young people. The lessons introduce students to a fictional island first, before exploring plastic in the oceans, coral reefs, and the impact of tourism on local communities and people.

Say hello to the Better World Detectives, and you may find a use for some of these resources within your KS2 curriculum.

Stuff...

We are underway with the Geography of our Stuff unit... This will involve us in exploring the personal geographies of the things that we own.
We also have been creating our Cultural Objects slide with the things that represent our teenage years.
We've followed the story of our uniform, created by SchoolBlazer, and will move onto t-shirts and sweatshops next.
Here's a video to get you thinking...

Check the FIREFLY page to find out more if you are KEJ pupil.