Charney Primary Conference #5: Saturday morning sessions

Mornings at Charney start with breakfast and chats, or for many an earlier get-up to catch the sunrise, or do some yoga in the grounds.

The Solar was once again the venue for the sessions. The first session was chaired by Dr. Tessa Willy.

Professor Simon Catling was first up. His session was on the "moral purpose of geography". This followed his excellent 'Dangerous Primary Geography' paper from last year's conference. He promised to share the paper and I will do that here when it is publicly available.

Joe Usher suggested that geography may be the silent G in STEM (in the same way as there is a silent 'g' in phlegm).

This referenced a LEGO project called the Lego League.

I hadn't been aware of this project. It offers a range of robotics / building projects which have a focus. Joe suggested that actually they were all broadly geographical: Aqua Adventure, Boom Town Build and Cargo Connect amongst others.

The latest project is called Superpowered. Once again, this is a geographical theme: sustainable energy. 

Lisa Clarke from DCU looked at curriculum thinking in a session called "We are all Geographers". She explored how our own education may influence our own teaching style and reintroduced the idea of a teacher's professional identity. (Seow, 2016)

Clare Brooks has previously talked about the idea of a teacher's 'professional compass' in this regard.

A coffee break followed.

The second session was kicked off by Anthony Barlow. It was called "Big picture made small".

He referred to how his involvement in a previous GA project while still a teacher had kickstarted his interest in the "hyperlocal".

He referred to George Monbiot (2012)'s description of our work as "the great global polishing".

He also pointed out just how little time teachers completing a PGCE actually get to learn about geography, and how it was important to plan this very carefully. 

Anne Dolan was up next. She had a focus on climate change and hopeful messages following COP27. She referenced some important work in Ireland. She has also written several excellent books for Primary geographers.

This was the Children and Young People's Assembly on Biodiversity Loss.

Watch the video to see what went on at this meeting. 

Anne also referenced the Dublin Declaration.

The session ended with Stephen Scoffham, the joint author of this excellent book with Steve Rawlinson - two previous GA Presidents working together in an area that they both have decades of experience in thinking about.

His session was called 'So what's geography got to do with it'?.

Stephen referenced a number of important areas of sustainability education. They included graphicacy, an idea developed by W G V Balchin and Alice Coleman.

Stephen suggested that the term "climate disruption" was a more appropriate term than the "change" that we tend to use.

The morning ended with a delicious meal - the catering at Charney Manor was excellent this year.