Secondary Geography Quality Mark

Getting started with your application

Deadline for registrations 31

December each year

Deadline for application submissions

end of June each year

1. Why do the Quality Mark ?

• Think through your reasons for applying… something you’ve already done – what do you want to get out of it…

- Individually / personally- For the department- For the school?- For the students?- For the wider comunity

2. A process of change

• Departmental involvement (staff development)

• Identifying areas for development and potentially leveraging funding for those as part of the process…

3. Departmental Self Evaluation

• This may be in addition to the requirements from SLT, or could replace some aspects of departmental monitoring and quality assurance.

• A process which staff should go through over a period of up to a year – not a quick thing…

4. Using pupils as evidence

• Pupil voice part of the process – an essential part…

• Let them know they are part of raising the Quality of geography teaching and learning within the department, and raising the profile of the department within (and beyond) the school.

• Google Form to canvas opinions and ideas

5. Asking (and answering) questions

• Each section of the framework includes a question to frame the discussions that you will have as a team over the coming months

• Look at the evidence that’s included in the new section of the website

6. Audit - honesty

• Targeting areas for improvement – the fact that you’ve opted to go for SGQM shows you are serious about this…

“Every teacher needs to improve, not because they are not good enough, but

because they can be even better.”

Dylan Wiliam

7. Support

• Julie Beattie at the end of an e-mail to GA• VLE – additional ideas of materials from

previous applicants – to be expanded during the next few months

• I’ve created a Dropbox folder which you have the link to – examples from King’s Ely application and others

8. Evidence

• The quality of evidence may not be a problem, but the choice of evidence can sometimes let schools down

• We are particularly interested in student work – don’t include pages and pages of data, but do include enough to support your comments

• Don’t need to evidence every section• We’re not looking for perfection… but certain

things can set our alarm bells ringing…

Submission Checklist

16 pieces of evidence

3 pieces of student work

1 Scheme of Work with some suggested lessons

1 Quality Lesson – which is hopefully representative of other lessons

Portfolio

• Tell the story of the department• Involve everyone – try not to make it look like

one person is leading everything… if they move on, what will happen ?

• Is Quality Geography ‘embedded’ ?

Summer moderation

• Quality of applications getting better all the time, so a weak one stands out

• Important to see what is planned next as well as what has come before (3 year accreditation)

Sections of the Form

A: Pupils’ attainment, progress and achievement in Geography

This section asks you to provide evidence showing that your pupils make significant progress in their geographical learning as measured from their starting points and capabilities. We also ask that you demonstrate that the standards of attainment in geography reached by pupils are high.

Reach high standards…

a.b.c.d.e.

Make significant progress

a.b.c.d.e.

Evidence for this section ideally will be a combination of any further data showing progress measures and attainment indicators and examples of pupils’ work, for instance showing outcomes that demonstrate your pupils have good knowledge appropriate for their age, good geographical understanding, an appreciation that places are interdependent and interconnected and that they are able to use subject specific vocabulary.

Demonstrate commitment to their achievement…

a.b.

B: Geography TeachingThis section asks you to show how you communicate enthusiasm and passion about geography to your pupils. Your evidence will show that the department has high expectations and a high level of confidence and geographical expertise, both in terms of your specialist and up-to-date knowledge and your, understanding of effective learning in geography. Evidence might be in the form of a mixture of long, mid and short term planning documents (schemes of work or selected extracts), lesson plans identifying the effective use of geographical data and ideas which are located and placed within a wider contextual knowledge of place, examples of the range of effective assessment methods you use and how you ensure progression in geography.

Teachers demonstrate enthusiasm

a.b.c.d.e.

Teachers have high expectations

a.b.c.d.e.

Teachers have expert knowledge of how pupils learn and make progress

a.b.c.d.e.

We would like examples of pupil work which exemplify that the key indicators have been met. This can be in a variety of forms such as photographs, scans, video, blogs, completed self assessment etc. It would be valuable to show how you take account of pupils’ views (formally and informally) and examples of your assessment methods with some ideally showing pupil involvement.

C: Behaviour and relationships in geography

This section asks you to show that your pupils have positive attitudes and generally enjoy their learning in geography. Evidence might include pupil testimony and pupils’ peer-feedback, photographs of students working with teacher annotations to illustrate the context, comments from outside speakers and parents etc, data from review processes, comments and statistics on behavioural problems/referrals in geography, departmental rewards systems, numbers opting for further study at GCSE and AS A2 and non GCSE Geography students choosing geography at AS/A2 level where appropriate. You may also provide evidence about how your pupils take an active part in understanding and managing risk such as those associated with fieldwork and out of classroom learning.

Pupils show positive attitudes and behaviour

a.b.c.

Values such as respect, tolerance and social responsibility support positive

relationships

a.b.c.

Pupils are aware of risk and safety issues

a.

D: Leadership and management in Geography

This section asks for evidence showing the impact of good leadership on the geography in your school. A good leader has the ability to:•develop a clear vision and strong sense of purpose for geography, which leads to improvements in outcomes for learners and is based on shared values and evaluation of evidence of current practice and outcomes. •mobilise, enable and support others to share the vision and develop and follow through on strategies to raise standards in geography.

There is a clear departmental vision and a sense of purpose

a.b.c.d.

Continuous self-evaluation is an integral part of the culture and

management of geographya.b.c.

Evidence could include review documents showing how the department has reflected on assessment evidence, pupil testimony and peer-feedback etc to inform curriculum change. Links with other agencies can be evidenced through testimony, (e mails etc) and enrichment activities can be demonstrated through annotated photographs.

Ethos of the geography department is enabling and supportive

a.b.

9. Departmental ‘extras’

• Publicity• Newsletters: internal and external• Fieldtrips: local, national and international

10. What now… ??

• Support: VLE – area of website - explore• Questions that you might have• If you want particular examples of particular

parts of the form e.g. D1b let me know and I can pass those through to you…