Geography and all that Jazz

Get yourself to Amazon or a local bookshop and get/order copies of our two new books, published in association with Can of Worms press... They are out today, and would make a great gift for the child in your life, from 8 to 88 and beyond... Amazon link Amazon link The official 'launch' will be in London tomorrow - we've already used a catapult and a rocket to 'launch' our books, and at the weekend, we'll be using balloons... If you're going to be in London at the weekend, get involved...  (see this Time Out link) Don't just take my word for how these books are, check out these other reviews: Mission:Explore is bold, cool, exciting, innovative, geographic, educational…and just plain fun! Every curious kid, budding geographer, and responsible parent should have a copy!” – National Geographic“ Designed to be read, scribbled on, illustrated, smeared, scratched and sniffed, it may just be the most revolutionary geography-related book...

In just over a month's time, there are two new Mission:Explore books launched on the world by The Geography Collective and Can of Worms Press. Here are the front covers for those who are interested. They are already available to pre-order on Amazon so make sure you buy at least one copy.... There will be launch events in London on the 1st and 2nd of April, but if you are around in London on the evening of the 31st of March, you can join us at the Old Explorer, just a short walk from Oxford Circus. Sign up to join us .... Plenty more to come in a month's time...

Here's Dan at the Outdoors Show at EXCEL on Thursday of this week.. He's talking about MISSION:EXPLORE .... Watch out for the TWO NEW Mission:Explore books coming out later in the year... If you'd like to partner with us , or find out more about having missions written in your area, or getting us into your school, get in touch !!

Some tickets arrived this morning... Now very excited.. See you in the Green Kids field for some Guerilla Geography... I will be writing up a series of posts about the experience, and also producing some links and resources to supplement existing ideas relating to music festivals... Just a reminder of the nice things people are saying about our Mission Explore book. .. "Mission:Explore is a brilliant way to stimulate children's and young people's interest in their social and physical environment, their curiosity and their sense of the absurd. The case for risk as a necessary and exciting part of life, that needs handling intelligently, is acknowledged well. This is geography, and fieldwork, at its most creative, and has the potential to inspire a new generation of thoughtful, ethical and courageous geographers." Susan Buckingham, Professor of Geography “it is very important for children to experience adventurous play and risk so they can learn to manage risk and keep...

I'm getting excited about my first visit to Glastonbury, to do missions with MISSION EXPLORE and members of the Geography Collective... To get me in the mood, I've downloaded the wonderful MISSION EXPLORE festival guide from the wonderful GEOGRAPHY COLLECTIVE BLOG page... Come and see us in the Green Kids Field... I hope we won't be needing those... Going to be working on some resources on music festivals of course too.... All images on this post by the wonderful Tom Morgan-Jones

The Mission : Explore book is finally out in print and available from tomorrow.... Buy as many copies as you can !! Come and see us at the GA Conference

The Mission Explore crew are going on the road this summer. You can catch us at the events listed above, with some others still to be added as we take the idea of Mission Explore to a range of audiences. Mission Explore is coming out soon in book form - I spent some time proof-reading the resources earlier, and they are looking cool. They can be pre-ordered for £6.... You can also help yourself to cool Mission Explore gear via our ONLINE SHOP. Busy times for the GEOGRAPHY COLLECTIVE I'll see you at GLASTONBURY - need to hunt out my loon pants....

Georgie is a gorilla on a mission: a MISSION : EXPLORE LONDON mission... Georgie is going to be in London this Saturday: the 16th of January and wants to carry out some special missions... For more information see: GEORGIE NEEDS A MISSION on Mission Explore website... Why not suggest a task for GEORGIE ?? You can send via TWITTER with the tag #GMission or #Gorillamission If you add a comment here with a mission I'll make sure they get passed on too...

New on Twitter are the Geography Collective at Mission Explore .... The book is now in pre-production... Watch for more exciting multi-media Exploring ness from the Collective. Visit the blog for some sample missions , including some BRAND NEW ONES !! "Great news for the young, and the young at heart" Iain Hallahan

You (and your kids) should get out more... Today's BBC NEWSROUND had an article on how young people today are not allowed to play out any more: climbing trees, or cycling to friends... This is the area that we are hoping to challenge with MISSION EXPLORE . More on getting out at PLAY ENGLAND.

This has been a strange week. Had the final week in my old job, final lessons, final activities, and saying lots of goodbyes. Also been doing preparations for September. Got a replacement sat nav: same Garmin model as before. When I turned it on for the first time, it had obviously not been turned on since it left the Taiwanese factory where it was manufactured, as you can see below. Seems to work fine so far... Also took delivery of my Vodafone mobile broadband USB stick, to keep me online when on the road. Works very nicely - in fact, a trial download had a faster speed than my home connection ! Also took delivery of quite a few books, including Barbara Ehrenreich's "Going to Extremes". Today, it was the arrival of the MOO CARDS with the MISSION EXPLORE mission samples on them. Coming soon to an INSET event near you. Thanks to Dan RE. So, now on holiday. Got some writing and other jobs to do before end of July. Also worth going to the People's Trust for Endangered...

Mission Explore One of my many side projects and interests is as a member of the GEOGRAPHY COLLECTIVE . One current project of the collective is the MISSION EXPLORE book. Dan Raven Ellison, another founder member of the collective is going to be presenting a session at Russell Davies' INTERESTING 08 later this month related to the book.