Coming up to revision time....

There are plenty of ideas for helping you with revision in the Badger GCSE Book that I wrote - over two years ago now...
I came across two useful posters of advice today.

These are taken from the Twitter feed @TandLToday of Archbishop Sentamu Academy.
Thanks for making these available for sharing

Free GCSE App available today only (22nd April)

Click HERE to get free revision app...

Book still available to buy...

We're coming up to another GCSE revision season...
Remember that there are plenty of great revision ideas in the GCSE Badger Book....

Available to purchase HERE.

GCSE Geography request...

I'm interested in the support strategies for GCSE Geography that seem to work the best for you.

I've also set this post up to show the potential for using GOOGLE FORMS for collecting data. This can be used for data collection for KS3 and GCSE/'A' level projects. It features in a new book on 'Fieldwork through Enquiry', which I wrote for the Geographical Association, and will be published later this year.

If you have a GMail account, you will already have a Google Drive available to you, which you can claim by visiting the site.
There is a HELP PAGE here.

If you had a minute or so to fill in the few questions that I've added below that would be much appreciated. As any entries are made, they will appear on a spreadsheet, and can then be analysed. There are also some immediate visualisation options....
Thanks in advance...

Using YouTube 2

Following the earlier post on the value of YouTube for revision, it's worth doing a quick search to see whether there is appropriate revision material available.
It's good to see that several teachers are creating and sharing this material.
Miss Room has a YouTube channel of videos that have had over 10 000 views in total (as of today) and cover a range of useful topics for GCSE Geography.

Why not set up your own YouTube channel ? It's easier than ever to record digital video these days - your phone probably allows you to take a video.

It's good to see a teacher who is sharing materials that are helpful not only to her own classes, but to anyone who finds them online. Also follow Miss Room on Twitter @GeographyCarrie

The final push...

Students around the country are preparing for the final days and weeks of the Summer 2012 exam season.
Make sure that you have prepared as carefully as possible.
The Badger book provides various strategies for revision.

Best of luck to everyone sitting exams this week.

Final push for the exams...

Very best wishes to all those who are sitting their GCSE Geography exams next week, and the teachers who have been preparing them for those exams.
Remember that there are plenty of materials online from the NINGs, to the awarding body websites, to the SLN Geography Forum to check for what teachers are sharing...

At least the weather this week has been good for revising: wet and windy. There are few worse things as a teenager than trying to revise when the sky is blue with the promise of a wonderful day spent outside.
A reminder that when teaching mid-latitude depressions a wet and windy day might be good...

There are also some apps that have been produced to help students with revision.
There is one for AQA that can be seen here. I don't have the app, but several teachers I know say that it has proved useful.

The Badger book describes the value of apps, and also includes an activity where students create content for their own revision app.

GCSE Geography Revision Questionnaire: 4 of 4

We are at the final of 4 posts which summarise some of the responses from the 94 students and teachers who answered my questionnaire earlier in the year...

This final question asked about Smartphones and whether they were used for revision and teaching and if so, which apps or features were used....

One teacher provided these specific recommendations:

Geography GCSE Revision App (£1.49)

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/geography-gcse-revision/id340221590?mt=8

GCSE Geography Bitesize Last-minute Learner (£1.49)

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/gcse-geography-bitesize-last/id410791814?mt=8

GCSE Geography Bitesize Podcasts

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/audio/geography/

Think Geography GCSE Geog Podcasts

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/think-geography-gcse-geog/id374013012

About a quarter of the respondents didn't own a smartphone, and one teacher said nicely "I am a technical dinosaur and my phone is a brick".

There were 15 people who owned a smartphone but hadn't as yet made use of many apps in their teaching, but that they would investigate further.

Some apps that were mentioned by name:

• iPlayer (for iPad)
• Flipbook
• The Guardian
• Bitesize App
• USGS Earhquake App
• AQA App
• Twitter
• National Geographic Atlas

One colleague had turned powerpoint slides into JPEGs so that they could be viewed on the phones.

Several teachers pointed out that many students had Blackberries because of the messaging, and wondered about the apps that might be available for these... any ideas ?

Google Docs are an area that could be more used.

James Mutton has just created one with the hope of creating a collaborative resource for Edexcel B

Check it out if you'd like to be involved...

Thanks to the teachers and students who took the time to fill in the document.

I shall be creating another document with some questions on the new curriculum later in the year to help guide another product. As before there'll be a prize on offer for all who take part...

GCSE Geography Revision Questionnaire: 3 of 4

OK - so we're coming up to REVISION TIME for GCSE colleagues.
The IB Geography papers are also being sat next week, so there's a lot of teenagers trying to revise.

Remember that there are some key revision tips in Chapter 7 of the Badger Book


This is the 3rd of three posts summarising the 94 responses I got to my Google Doc on GCSE Geography revision earlier in the year....

Two more questions are summarised in this blog post....

The first one asked about the topics that people found the hardest to teach / revise....


There was a broad range of over 20 topics that were mentioned (most of the course really by someone) including some topics that I wouldn't have expected to be there..

The areas that were featured the most were:

• Weather and Climate, particularly depressions 
• Industry / Economic Activities
• Map Skills
• Population
• Economic Development

It seems that there are also some issues with Case Studies: from their frequency to the depth that is needed.

• Some colleagues were concerned about the amount that needs to be revised compared to the amount that is actually examined.
• Level marking
• Timing
• Depth of answers that are required (sometimes too much, at other times not enough...)
• Use of Diagrams

You will be pleased to hear that Chapter 7 tackles revision, and Chapter 8 looks at exam preparation and skills....

Which brings us on to the next question:
What additional help would students / teachers want to help them with revision  ?

This might lead on to some actual resources that need to be prepared, or perhaps some collaborative efforts from teachers. I will share some ideas for these (and the previous question) in future posts on this blog.
Quite a few teachers were fine without any further support, and others suggested that greater consistency from the Awarding Bodies, better Specifications and better questions would help.

Some interesting comments worth mentioning...

• Case Study notes with tasks to help unpick them (have been producing some KS3 resources for Harper Collins very like this...)
• Online Videos
• 'Current' Case Study material (no shortage of ideas for that on Living Geography of course)
• Podcasts

Ready made display and other material was mentioned, although I always enjoyed creating my own displays in my room...

Finally, a multimedia resource / textbook of some kind was mentioned - the arrival of iBooks Author earlier in the year makes this sort of collaborative resource a possibility, and we are planning something related to this for the GA Conference 2013. 

The final post in this series will look at the Apps that people have found useful when revising and teaching GCSE Geography...

GCSE Geography Revision Questionnaire: 2 of 4

Second of 4 posts summarising the 94 responses I had to my GCSE Geography revision questionnaire that I had on a Google Form earlier in the year....


The second part of the questionnaire asked teachers and students to assess the value of various common methods of revision.


I asked students to rate them on a scale from 1 to 5, where 1 was never used / not useful and 5 was always used / really useful


Here are the average scores for each of the methods....


Copying out Notes: 2.4
Summarising Notes: 3.7
Flash Cards: 3.4
Revision Sessions at School: 4
BBC Bitesize: 3.2
Practising past paper: 4.3


The next question produced some very lengthy responses from some respondees, some of which are repeated below.
I hope that these might be useful for some last minute revision as we move into exam season after the May Day Bank Holiday....


How else do you revise / help students revise other than what has already been mentioned ?


I don't have room to go through them all here, but will be using some of them for future posts for purchasers of the Badger GCSE Book....


One teacher provided a 7 point programme for revision, which sounds quite useful:

Usual exam practice in class with students goes like this... 

(1) Deconstruct question by examining command words. 

(2) Identify content that needs to be addressed in the answer

(3) Generate a writing frame

(4) Have a go at writing an answer

(5) Peer assess work

(6) Compare with a model answer 

(7) Identify individual points for improvement.

Here's another sample of the respondees ideas that I particularly liked... a quick ten to kick us off...

1. Pass the parcel exam question answer formation

2. I use a lot of spider diagram / mind maps over a single sheet of A3 per section - colour them, use images etc

3. Blog with daily 20 minute activities in the run up to the exam

4. Dart board games - checkout requires students to hit the correct words in order.

5. Rely on good classroom teaching!

6. We have an integrated system of GCSE revision which we are gradually building. I have written 3 revision guides - one for each unit - specifically tailored to the course and the case studies we use - they are quite chunky but they become active workbooks during the revision lessons

7. Dealing with dyslexics - we make audio recordings for them to listen to on their MP3

8. Tarsia puzzles

9. Ridiculous actions to remember things 

10.  Visual prompts around school (this idea features in the Badger book with some examples....)

Next post - which topics are the 'hardest to revise' ??

GCSE Geography Revision Questionnaire: 1 of 4

Earlier in the year, as part of the preparation for the publication of the new Badger GCSE Grade Booster book (have I mentioned that  ?) I put a GCSE Revision Questionnaire online as a Google Form.

The Badger book has a section on using Google Docs to help revision by the way.

In this and the next three posts, I shall go through the results that came in.

Thanks to the 94 people who answered the questions...
There were 64 teachers and 30 students (thanks to Liz Smith's class who answered the questions in particular)

Specifications being taught (teacher responses only)

AQA A: 17 - the most popular

AQA B: 7

Edexcel A: 5

Edexcel B: 10

OCR A: 3

OCR B: 12 - the 2nd most popular

WJEC A: 5

WJEC B: 3

CCEA: 1

iGCSE: 1

Websites used to help with revision

BBC will be pleased to hear that BBC Bitesize got 65 mentions, the most of any other website by a long way.

S-Cool: 21

Nings: 8

You Tube: 2

Geography all the Way: 5

Anthony Bennett's seminal Internet Geography: 5

Cool Geography: 6

GeoBytesGCSE (Rob Chambers): 1

SAM Learning - mentioned by some of the students but not the teachers - probably relates to a school subscription

Funky Geography: Liz Smith’s blog

BBC Class Clips: 3

Staffordshire Learning Net and Forum: 5

Terry Jones also shared some Revision Flashcards on SLN: http://learningnet.co.uk/geoforum/index.php?topic=7122.0

Well done to Henry Scott for starting his own revision blog too....

Letts Revise: 1

Geography Lost: 1

School's own VLE: 7

Abbeyfield Humanities Blog got 2 mentions - nice work by Mr. Drake

Blythe Bridge School website - which apparently has "good revision sheets": 1

Share Geography: 1 

Geography Clinic: 1

Worldlywise Wiki from Chesterton Community College: 2

GeographyPods.com: 1

Revision World: 2

Revision Centre: 2

Geographyfieldwork.com: 1

NGFL: 1

Kerboodle: 1

Radical Geography: 1

NGFL Wales: 1

BBC News: 2

Edmodo: 1

TES: 3

In the next 3 posts: 

- how best to revise - techniques and tips from colleagues

- which topics are hardest to revise ?

- how can smartphones and apps help revision ?

And of course you know what to do if stuck for ideas....

Draw Something for Revision

One of the teachers who features in the book is Tony Cassidy. I've 'known' Tony for about 8 years, at first through SLN Geography Forum. I've also done various bits of work with him over the years.

Tony has produced a nice idea which builds on the current publicity of the Draw Something App.


It's a geographical version as a powerpoint.
It's available from Tony's SHARE GEOGRAPHY website which has plenty of other interesting ideas to support your GCSE students.


Ready, steady, revise....

I've also been interested to see JUST A MINUTE on BBC2 at the moment.
I used this format as a context for student revision.

Speak for one minute on a topic drawn at random (or generated using a TRIPTICO random generator tool)
Students must speak without:

REPETITION
DEVIATION
HESITATION

Prize Winner

Congratulations to Catherine Hardman, whose name was drawn at random from those who had left their e-mails on my GCSE Revision questionnaire, which was set up to help provide information for the forthcoming launch of the Badger GCSE Grade Booster book. She wins a copy of my award winning KS3 Toolkit book: "Look at it this Way"- you can buy a copy of the toolkit at the GA Conference next weekend (ah ! - it's next weekend !)

Come and find me to get more details about the Badger book.... I saw copies of the design of the covers last week and am looking forward to seeing the interiors too...

If you want to contribute to the questionnaire it's not too late...

You can find it here...
Special thanks to Liz Smith, who did the questionnaire with a group of students too.

Geography GCSE Booster now available to pre-order

Badger Learning is now live.

Badger Publishing's new site.
You can visit the site to see my new book. It brought together some of the ideas I'd been working on for a while, along with a few more that were kindly  lent to me by colleagues (who are all acknowledged in the book, and will also be listed here once I have my hands on a physical copy of the book....)

The book will be useful to those who are preparing students for external assessments, but I would say that a lot of the ideas are transferrable - they are basically good geography....

The book is now available to pre-order (it will be out in April)

GCSE Grade Boosters: Geography Contents

• Introduction – what does a C grade geographer look like, and how can students raise their grade to a C and beyond.
• Memorable geography – a range of geography activities which can be re-versioned for other topics or particular pupils; includes thinking graphs, lucky lines, maps from memory, and ideas funnel to name just a few.
• Students as experts – establishing students as experts and joint creators of resources.
• Enquiries – how to introduce, explore and communicate the Big Geographical Questions.
• Controlled assessment – how to approach controlled assessment, complete with examples to illustrate the support that can be provided.
• Revision techniques – graphic organisers, memory techniques and the power of blogging.
• Help from the examiners – exam specs and question types – where and how marks are gained and lost.
• Memorable vocabulary – key vocabulary for exam success plus techniques for learning it.
• Exciting new tools – word clouds, triptico, google docs and google earth.
• Geography after the exam – why a good grade in geography can take you places.

Author: Alan Parkinson an experienced and award-winning teacher with an international reputation for creative and innovative teaching. He has worked with thousands of teachers at hundreds of CPD events in the UK and Europe. This title draws extensively from the experience of successful schools around the country.
Featuring:

• A wide range of activities to make the topics covered memorable. Activities can be used for class, group, pair and homework tasks. They can be versioned by you for other topics or particular pupils
• Support for exam preparation including a distillation of examiners reports to pinpoint common errors and show
• how easily marks are lost and gained, as well as revision and memory techniques that have been shown to work
• Help with controlled assessment and how to approach it to get the best results
• The key vocabulary for exam success plus techniques for learning it
• 80 page photocopiable book with re-versionable activities on accompanying CD-ROM. 

A perfect gift for Easter.... :)

Using Google Forms

One of the sections in the forthcoming book for Badger explores the use of GOOGLE FORMS, with some suggestions for how they can be used, as part of the GOOGLE DOCS suite.
An element of 'getting better grades' is appropriate preparation for the written examination which comes at the end of the course.
The use of web tools can help with revision, and also other aspects of the teaching of the course.
With that in mind, as an example in the book, I have produced a Google Form to gather information, to show how it can be used to produce real data that can then be displayed and visualised.

The form is embedded below, and I would be really grateful if you could spend a few minutes filling it in, and if you find yourself in a room with some computers and a GCSE group to ask them to spend a few minutes filling it in too. It would be really great to get hundreds of responses that can then be shared to give a snapshot of the current thoughts on GCSE REVISION


Alternatively direct your students to this web address: http://bit.ly/gcserevision
You can fill the form in your browser by following this link, which can also be shared with colleagues....


It would be great to see hundreds of people filling this in, both staff and students.


Thanks in advance for your help.

If you are a teacher, please add your e-mail address into the final box along with your location, and I'll enter you into a prize draw which I shall draw on the 1st of April and one person (or maybe more than one if I'm feeling flush) will win a copy of my KS3 Toolkit book "Look at it this Way" (whether they want it or not...)