Information for secondary school teachers
Field study days
We can offer data collection field study days for GCSE Geography classes. Students will collect flow rate data, river depth and profile information and create a fieldwork sketch map.
If you would like more information about the content of the day, and to book one for your school, please get in touch with Tania Crockett, Learning Coordinator on 01768 866788 learning@edenrt.org
ArcGIS resources
We have worked closely with teachers from secondary schools in the Eden Catchment to develop a range of free resources to support your teaching of river topics.
Created using ArcGIS, a Geographical Information System used by professionals and designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyse, manage and present spatial or geographic data, these resources are all web based, so you don’t have to download software to access them.
Resources include:
Online story maps
Interactive maps, often using multimedia, to explore geographical features, case studies, people’s stories and much more.
Web-mapping resources
Data-led resources that students can import data to/ investigate in order to be able to complete tasks and answer questions about key topics.
Teachers’ notes
– Background info, plus suggested questions and tasks to be used in conjunction with each resource, plus
– Video tutorials on how to use ArcGIS and how to create a hydrology web map.
We have suggested key stages that these resources may be most suitable to use with, but these are not prescriptive, please feel free to adapt them to suit your classes.
Online story maps
Jude Hodson, Trinity School, Carlisle has tried out the resources:
Having used the Eden Rivers Trust’s GIS lessons I can thoroughly recommend them. Using GIS in lessons is something many Geography teachers understandably shy away from but even for the technologically uninitiated the programmes and storyboards are intuitive to use. The videos which have been made to be used alongside the more complex lessons explain how to use the maps to get whatever information you are looking for.
The lessons are very useful, and I have used them from year 7, all the way through to 6th form, as the tasks are clearly differentiated and lend themselves to use during topics all the way through the curriculum. The amount of data available on the 6th form lessons is impressive, and means that a whole range of different processes can be investigated. The year 7 lessons I have used extensively, and the teachers’ helpsheets are very clear and informative when using the online resources. The students were fully engaged and interested in finding the information available to them. The videos of the wildlife in the Eden they found particularly enthralling, and they loved the maps with information embedded in them.