Getting started

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Geogs
Every lesson begins with ‘Geogs’, a warm-up into the geography world. This is mainly content-based and involves throwing an inflatable globe around the class, encouraging child participation. The child with the globe asks a question of the child it is thrown to.

Geogs questions can include naming locations and features, calling out countries found in different continents or challenging questions for peers.

This activity allows children to engage in geography from the beginning of a lesson, and the element of holding the world captivates the child audience. It also focuses children for the lesson in the same way the mental oral starter in numeracy aims to.
[Fran Martin, University College, Worcester]

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Weather
Many pupils find ‘Weather’ a difficult topic to internalise. From the beginning of teaching the topic to the end of the academic year (and beyond if it is taught in year 10), the teacher could ask one pupil each lesson to provide a two-minute weather forecast for the day – the forecast must include a brief explanation of why the weather is occurring as it is. After a period of time most pupils are able to identify the typical weather conditions associated with high-pressure and low-pressure systems.
[Charles Rawding, Edge Hill College of Higher Education]

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Wordmats 1
Make some 'wordmats' - attractive A3 sheets with relevant vocabulary for your current scheme of work and a couple of large images. Photocopy the mats onto coloured paper and lay them out on each desk before the pupils arrive (one each or one between two). Use them for starter activities, for example finding the odd one out, defining the words or match the words to the pictures.

For more ideas on word mats, visit the Staffordshire Learning Network website (www.sln.org.uk/geography) and search for 'Geo spelling mats'
[David Beresford, Coleridge Community College, Cambridgeshire]

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Explain the image
Find an intriguing or striking photograph. Use an OHP or interactive whiteboard to show it to the class. Ask pupils, in pairs or individually, to brainstorm explanations for how the people or place shown in the photo got to be that way. Reveal the answer after different ideas have been aired, or leave it until the end of a lesson and see if pupils are more certain. You could give pupils a worksheet with the photo and boxes to fill in with their predictions and the answer.
[David Beresford, Coleridge Community College, Cambridgeshire]

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Quick scramble
A quick warm-up activity: write scrambled phrases relevant to the current topic on the board. Pupils try to unscramble them as they are arriving.
[Helena Richards, Beauchamps High School, Essex]

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Parachute jump
To introduce a study of a country/region: inform the pupils that they are about to land in the country by parachute. What are they likely to see on their way down? What would they like to find out about the place before landing? In pairs, write a list of questions and share them with the rest of the class.

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Getting started on an issue
As a starter to exploring an issue, draw a balloon and write the name of the issue in the middle. Create a spider diagram around it to ask pupils to write questions that they would like to know about the issue -- when, how, why, who? -- to foster an enquiry-based approach from the outset.
[Sarah Hide, Haverstock School, Camden]

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Shop types
As a starter to an investigation of shopping, use images of types of goods to stimulate pupils into discussing categories of shops selling the goods (eg convenience and comparison)
[Sue Gray, Gleed Girls’ Technology College, Spalding]

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