Curriculum for Wales is the pioneering curriculum which aims to raise standards and enable teachers to use their professional skills to meet local needs. The official start in both primary and secondary schools has been delayed until 2022. There are 6 Areas of learning Experience (AoLE). Geography is situated with history, social studies, business studies and RE in the Humanities AoLE. To help students learn in a more coordinated way What matters statements identify common themes, concepts and transferable skills in each AoLE. Teachers will develop their own curriculum based on the What matters statements.

The GA Welsh Special Interest Group is supporting teachers in their curriculum development process by producing a series of PowerPoint scaffolds on a variety of Humanities themes for years 7–9 (equivalent to KS3 in England). Each scaffold suggests learning opportunities for history, social studies, business studies and RE, but the real substance is to identify the geography which can be explored within the theme. Each theme highlights several geographical strands, with key questions, examples and links to the What matters statements.

To date there are 8 themes available on the GA website:

• All conflicts great and small
• Cynefin
• Globalisation
• Inequality
• Journeys
• Material world
• Stewardship
• Water.

Wales SIG plans to develop more scaffolds for years 7–9 as well as for Early Years/Primary.

Although the scaffolds are designed for Wales, teachers in England may find the ideas and examples really useful in their KS3 curriculum.

There is more information in this article from GA Magazine.

Curriculum for Wales document

Webinars

Curriculum for Wales webinars – watch this video with Gill Miller and Steve Brace

The importance of GCSE geography video

10 November – Planning the transition

02 February – Fieldwork experiences