KEY STAGE 3 (FOUNDATION) STRATEGY
STARTERS AND PLENARIES
Updated April 2005
New Ideas for using Newspapers in Starters / Plenaries (& 'Geography in the News' site)
We will all shortly have to start coming up with ideas for STARTERS, PLENARIES and the rest. No doubt there will be a lot of duplication of effort, so hopefully there will be some swapping of ideas and someone will collect them in a useful online location: perhaps Curriculum Online will help, and there will probably be publishers working on them right now. Some books featuring them have already appeared.
Further details on STARTERS.
(As explained by Rob Lodge, Foundation Subjects consultant)
Starters fulfil a range of purposes, in particular using prior knowledge to introduce new topics. They also engage the class early on in the lesson and help motivation. All pupils are quickly on task, and are challenged.
They need to do the following:
create a challenge
create an expectation that pupils will be thinking, and all participating in the lesson
produce an expectation of interaction and involvement
avoids the trend towards starting with administrative tasks e.g register which sometimes holds up the start and creates an opportunity for disruption and conflict with certain groups
How to overcome any problems with planning the use of starters ?
Careful planning and preparation
Deal decisively with distractions
Adhere to planned timings - don't go over time as there will be no time for the main body of the lesson
Provide additional support for some individual pupils
Add extra complexity for certain pupils
Need to allow for people who arrive late - perhaps have the function of the starter on a separate card for them to read
How to make sure that starters are successful ?
Plan it as a discrete element of the lesson
Ensure that it fits into the lesson objectives and helps to meet them
Take account of the learning needs of the group
Make sure that starters show progression over time, and use different ones.
Keep the instructions clear and precise
Talk to colleagues and exchange ideas - you can also look at the Internet for more ideas
Discuss the ideas in a departmental meeting
Also needs a main lesson challenge/focus.
This follows on from the STARTER, and leads towards the PLENARY.
Remember to build in opportunities for ASSESSMENT.
Be aware of the difference between SUMMATIVE and FORMATIVE assessment.
A good starter should be an engaging task, something which gets the group thinking, and sets them a challenge which the lesson will then hopefully allow them to meet, or set out a mystery which they must solve within the time. It should get pupils 'on task', and perhaps be humorous or thought provoking in some way. It's essentially an alternative to the usual "OK, who can remember what we did last lesson ?" sort of question to the whole class. As with these questions, the starter can be targeted towards a particular group. It establishes a precedent for the rest of the lesson.
Need to keep them SHORT! - 5 minutes max! Keep an eye on the clock or use some musical cue to keep time. When the music ends, the activity stops. There was an article on a History teacher who was a finalist in the National Teaching Awards who used music as a cue for several activities. When the students heard the music, they knew what sort of task they had been set, and had a sense of urgency and purpose towards completing it.
Starters help the pace and structure of lessons.
One good resource to get hold of (only about £3 each) are little individual whiteboards and pens. Questions can be posed, and activities carried out where pupils have to write down an answer, and you then say 'SHOW ME'. It can be used to decide which groups of people go forward to the next round, or have a variation on the old Mike Read favourite 'Run Around' (what do you mean you don't remember it...) - the idea is that there are several answers, and any people who choose the correct one got a coloured ball, and the people with the most won a prize...
Can also take the form of video clips - perhaps downloaded from the web. There is a good video of permeable paving at the FORMPAVE site, and a great short film of continental drift at the end of the movie ICE AGE.
A card or cards with numbered words or statements or phrases. Read out 3 or 4 numbers and the students need to identify the odd one out from the list.
Defining geographical terms without using particular words, and someone else has to identify them.
from David Leat books: some already prepared at the THINKING SKILLS page on this site.
Could also be a couple of minutes of a mystery video: it's worth looking at the TV listings for the content of the episode of the Simpsons on BBC2 or Sky 1 as they frequently have relevant topics to some lessons. In the last few weeks they've covered immigration and safari holidays, Brazilian favelas and other relevant topics.
Try also
A starter needs to be a mental warm up: try and use them to link the learning, and/or set the objectives in an imaginative way.
Give students some items and they have to decide in a limited time how they would use them to teach a geographical concept. This is an idea I read, but am not sure how I would actually use it - anyone got any ideas ?
A quick 5 minute demo of an activity, or explanation. One example would be the use of an apple to show the problem of housing the world' s population on a shrinking earth....
Have a simple Venn: this could be on the wall perhaps on an A2 piece of paper. Cards have to be placed in the correct section of the VENN intersections. To stay in the game, you have to put your card in the correct place e.g Year 8 work on Crime from the GEOG DOT series features a similar activity...
This could of course be a bit of a giveaway if you're starting a new topic, as the topics for the year are prominently displayed in my classroom. However, you could reveal increasingly easy clues, and give points or credit to people who identify the place first. This could be adapted of course: name the process... etc. A variation of this is used in the GA Worldwise quiz.
WORD ASSOCIATION
SOAP OPERAS: or some topical TV programme - very likely that programmes e.g. The Simpsons, feature topics relevant to Geography, particularly Human geography...
MAKE A NOISE!
One interesting way to make pupils think is to play them a sound. WAV format files are one way of storing the information, and these can be accessed via Powerpoint presentations and other software.
I've included one example which I played to my groups: the sound of LAVA.
Microsoft's DIGITAL GALLERY LIVE has some sound files which can be downloaded. These can be added to Power-point presentations to make them a little more memorable. They can be chosen, put into a selection basket which will then be downloaded and placed (appropriately enough) in the Downloaded clips section of the Clip Art Gallery.
Try also to think of topical music to go with certain lessons - this could also be a 'fun' plenary - get pupils to think of song titles or band names which are to do with the topic they are studying. For example, a lesson on 'WEATHER' could provide lots of opportunities for tracks and band names...
I recently used Louis Armstrong "What a Wonderful World" and Sylvia "Y Viva Espana" to play alongside PHOTO JAMs. Some good sites around for getting TV Theme Tunes, many of which provoke a response from pupils.
2 photos. Need to look at the comparisons and contrasts between the two. Simple enough to find a range of Geographical images.
Step into the photograph. Focus on a particular person featured and ask the pupils to imagine what the person might be thinking, where are they going ? etc.
BINGO
This has been used in a number of contexts. It is also featured in a number of textbooks which have recently been published.
For example, if doing a piece of work on TOURISM, you can perhaps look at the different types of holidays that people take and the reason why people go on holiday. Give each pupil a bingo card, which has a series of boxes on which are phrases related to tourism, where you have to FIND SOMEONE WHO.... - the group has 5 minutes to try to speak to other members of the group to find people who match up with the statements on the card....
e.g. Find Someone Who....
Has been on holiday in a caravan
Has been in the cockpit of an aircraft
Has a parent who goes on holiday on business
Has a wooden carving from Africa in their house
Has never been out of the country on holiday
Has slept in a tent for a week etc.
The aim being to look at various topics related to tourism...
A similar exercise is sometimes called DOMINOES.
Using individual whiteboards - we have purchased some for use in the department...
PHOTOJAM / PHOTO STORY
This is a free download from the SHOCKWAVE website. The free version cannot be saved or sent to anyone or copied to CD ROM, but if you have a folder of images of classroom displays, fieldtrips, school environment etc. a few mouse-clicks and you have a presentation suitable for Open Evenings, starters etc. all with music added and some very groovy fades, particularly in the '80's video' mode. First saw this demonstrated by Chris Durbin about 3 years ago now..
A RECIPE FOR....
This is an idea featured in a diagram in the 'Investigating Geography' textbook series published by Hodder and Stoughton.
Give them some words which are the recipe for something i.e.: if you put them together something is created..could be a combination of items and processes which act on them..
e.g INGREDIENTS
Coal
Iron Ore
Limestone
Bessemer Converter
OR
Headland
Joints
Hydraulic Action
Time
PICTIONARY
At the IMAGINATION AT WORK site you can get access to a SCRIBBLE PAD with a floating pen interface. You can change the pen colour and style. This is a nice resource. What are you going to do with it ?
'A LITTLE BIT OF BULLY'
(which will mean nothing to anyone under 30...)
Thanks to Tony Cassidy for this idea.
Head over to your friendly local warehouse clearance / book clearance store, and they may well have a MAGNETIC DARTBOARD. This will perhaps be in a box or a tube and will cost around £4 to £5. These work surprisingly well.
Tony Cassidy has produced a POWERPOINT with a space for each number (and the bullseye) The questions on the provided powerpoint are for general revision, but you can change them of course, or even add a sound file or image to identify. If you come up with an interesting variation let me (and Tony) know.
GETTING IN A TWIST
Another Tony Cassidy idea
You'll need several copies of TWISTER BOARD for this one.
MORE IDEAS COMING SOON
WHAT IF ? GEOGRAPHY IDEAS
Can I suggest you head over to the fabulous selection of documents available at BRIGHTON and HOVE's site on the FOUNDATION STRATEGY . This is one of the best sets of documents I've come across. Recommended.
A new COUNTRY CODE was introduced in 2004. If you go to the COUNTRYSIDE ACCESS website which has been set up, you can check out all the details. Aardman animations have provided a CREATURE COMFORTS style animation to introduce the new Country Code. It's a 5 Mb download, and runs to around 60 seconds but would make a good starter activity. I use this with Year 8 groups when looking at TOURISM in the UK.
SOME IDEAS FOR USING NEWSPAPERS
Thanks to Jonathan Wolton from the RGS for posting these ideas (and many more) on SLN Forum
HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU ?
At the end of the show, there is a section where contestants have to guess the missing word from the covered up section:
e.g Geography Pages is ggggggg
(answers on a postcard...)
FACT OR OPINION
Hand out a newspaper story and using 2 highlighters (or different coloured underlining) distinguish FACT from OPINION in the story.
FOLLOW THAT NEWS
Ask the students to follow a news story for some time (specify) - summarise the main developments and produce a display board. Time line of articles can be created to show the development of the story.
CUT AND PASTE
Take an article (could simplify in Word processor) - cut it up and get the pupil to sequence it correctly e.g. build up to a volcanic eruption, events before and after flood
HEADLINERS
Invent headlines for Geographical stories
The Geography in the News site is soon to go SUBSCRIPTION based. The cost is a very reasonable £50, which can be increased to a school membership of the RGS for £70, which also includes
There is a good Scheme of Work to be downloaded from the RGS-IBG site. Head over to the EDUCATION page of the main RGS site, and you'll see the link. Some fascinating ideas.
Useful textbook:
"Assessment in Practice: Raising Standards in Secondary Education" - John Hopkin, Steve Telfer and Graham Butt (GA, 2000)
Lesson needs to be brought to a close with an activity which goes through the main learning focus for the lesson. It's all about metacognition...
This needs to follow on from the main body of the lesson and recap on the learning points.
SENTENCE STEMS
Have a series of starters to sentences which are about the work that has been carried out. Put them into a hat, and hand them round and perhaps play music and when it stops the person has to take a slip of paper out of the hat and complete the sentence that they have the starter too...
For more ideas on PLENARIES go HERE.
Here are some other PLENARY IDEAS.
List 3 things you / your neighbour found out today...
Write all the words relating to today's work you can in the next 60 seconds
Create a mnemonic to remember today's key idea
The answer is ******* - now write the question...
Which of n statements is the best...
What will happen next ? What will we do next lesson ?
Self assessment: target setting
True or False
Any more bright ideas ? Let me know and I'll put them here....
At the GA Conference 2007, came across the PLENARY PYRAMID at Kate Russell's R U WEBWISE workshop. It may be an old one on you, but it's a new one on me...
3 key words that are important on the bottom row
2 words on the middle row that have made an impression
1 thing on the top row that you will do next to follow up, or one question to ask...
BUILD UP YOUR LEARNING !
WEBCAM WALL - a new ideas for a starter for lessons
Tony Cassidy has launched instructions for making a WEBCAM WALL: would be a fantastic talking point as students come into the classroom: http://radicalwebcamgeography.co.uk/2007/04/02/creating-a-web-cam-wall/