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Places

Contents:

Contrasting UK Locality Resources

European Resources

Localities in Economically Developing Countries

Books on Whole Countries

Distant Place Packs

Many of these packs, which include quality A4 photos, teachers notes and pupil information, are now linked with videos. Some of them can be bought with videos. Others can be purchased in addition to or separately from the video, which is part of an educational television geography programme. The range of these resources is increasingly wide and good, especially for localities beyond the UK. Most packs are produced with Key Stage 2 in mind, but imaginative teachers successfully adapt them for Key Stage 1. Most need modification even at Key Stage 2 to suit your school and pupils. Some schemes of work now deliberately include localities which are similar to those found in published packs, e.g. Chembokalli, St. Lucia, change in the Swat Valley have pages in the Ginn Key Stage 2 Geography scheme. Those listed with an asterisk are either designed for Key Stage l or have been found to work particularly well for younger children. Where possible the data of publication has been given, to indicate how up to date the information is.

A. Contrasting UK Locality Resources

Publishers have been slow to develop resources for these. If you are unable to link with another school and exchange materials, both commercial and pupil-produced, or to visit a contrasting locality, preferably on a residential visit for upper juniors, then these photo and data packs are available.

Rural Resources:

1. Flatford - A Contrasting UK Locality for Key Stages I and 2 (1998) Edward Jackson and Wendy Morgan.

Flatford Mill, world-famous for its Constable connections, is also a centre for residential field work and ideal for the study of a contrasting UK locality. This multi-faceted new resource comprises:

OS map extracts of five different scales, three in full-colour and two with multiple copies, plus sketch maps.
30 full-colour A4 photographs, including several aerial shots.
Data banks on people, goods, services, weather.
Full background Information.
80 graded activities.

The Geographical Association, £20 members, £30 non-members.

2. Discover Godstone - A resource pack providing teachers with everything they need to carry out an in-depth study of a contrasting UK locality. Based on the children and village of Godstone in Surrey, it has been designed for Key Stages l and 2 and written by primary school teachers. Obtainable from Wildgoose Publications mentioned in the first section.

3. Malham Tarn Resource Pack and Video

This pack includes 27 A4 sheets of information for pupils, maps and diagrams, plus aerial photographs, pictures and Yorkshire Dales National Park leaflets to give a complete picture of the area. (IPC 123861) Obtainable from The Educational Television Company, PO Box 100, Warwick CV34 6TZ.

The video is divided into 5 sections:

Around Malham Tarn

Hills, Valleys and Streams

Farms and Farming

Malham Village and the National Park

Activities and Facilities

Teachers will find the video a useful aid in the classroom whether or not they are planning a visit to Malham, especially if it is used in conjunction with the Malham resource pack. Together they provide the materials needed to study Malham as a contrasting locality.

The first 4 sections show useful examples for physical and environmental geography. The last section shows what it will be like for the children that actually visit and covers issues that would interest parents such as accommodation, health and safety.

Duration: 25 minutes.

For further information contact: Cambridge Video Production, Part of the University of Cambridge, Local Examinations Syndicate, 1 Hills Road, Cambridge, CB1 2EU, Telephane: 01223 553311 Ext 3416.

4. Rural Locality: Sedburgh

A good photo and poster pack with a teachers’ book including photocopiable worksheets about this small town in the Yorkshire Dales and its surrounding National Park. Folens 1995.

5. Betws-Y-Coed: A Contrasting Locality in Wales

A well produced pack with a clear structure for enquiry, containing A4 photos, postcards, teachers’ notes and clear appropriate worksheets.Your own resources and artefacts, if you have been to the area, would help enhance this good pack. Field Studies, Council Publications, Preston Montford, Shewsbury,SY4 1HW Tel: 01743 850370 Fax: 01743 850178.

6. Stanton Le Peak

Four BBC 2ig Zag Programmes comparing Stanton village to nearby Manchester. A photo resource pack and teachers’ book can be obtained from BBC Publications and the series is best used with this.

7. Bringing the countryside into the Classroom: the Lychford File

This is an innovative resource produced for Key Stage 2 which could be used to develop a rural UK locality unit of work in geography, with particular attention to settlement and environmental issues. As published, it would be most suitable for upper juniors, although a skilled teacher could sift, select and adapt materials for any age.

Many urban schools, because of transport costs and safety issues, are not able to provide first hand learning about a rural environment. This resource most certainly enables children to learn as realistically about the countryside as it is possible to do through second hand resources. It presents rural life in an Exmoor village, with its jobs and leisure, in a straightforward realistic way through the voices and video scenes of the inhabitants and farmers. Conflicts of interest in the changing environment arise naturally (e.g. hunting, raising stock as a business, "outsiders" moving in, ripping up hedgerows) and are dealt with in a balanced way. The resource, at £29.99 plus £5.25 p&p represents very good value for money, with aerial and snapshot photos, an hour of video and two hours of audio tape, which can be selected from or used over a long period of time, laminated workcard, maps and a range of other resources. You would need to buy at least one O.S. 1:50 000 map which locates Lychford and an O.S. tourist map of Exmoor, as these are not included. The pack could also be used to develop aspects of the science, history, art and English curriculum as a minimum.

Obtainable from: The Countryside Foundation, Dean Clough Industrial Park, Dean Clough, Halifax, HX3 5A

Urban Resources

8. The Local Network Resource Pack

(Complements the Channel 4 TV programme)

This pack is designed to help children study a contrasting UK locality. The pack contains maps, notes, photographs, children’s work and other material from three different places featured in the programmes - Colton, a village in Staffordshire; the Old Dean Estate in Camberley, Surrey; and Swansea city centre. (IPC 123959)

NB: Although this is a useful series, it considers the issues raised by looking at 4 different localities. Is it better to focus on one and get some depth.

9. Clerkenwell

This photopack resource with posters, a teacher’s books of notes and photocopiable worksheets for pupils focuses on a London locality. It demonstrates typical urban features including details of people, industry, houses, shops and schools.

Folens 1997

Facts about London

www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/questions/regions/london.htm

10. Discover Croydon

This pack contains 24 A4 colour photos, photocopiable resource sheets, a teacher’s guide, O.S. map extracts, to enable a Croydon family and school to be studied along with the physical and human geography, shopping and the Croydon Tram Link. Wildgoose Publications, 1996 (£19.95).

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