Geography and all that Jazz

Interested in GIS in school but not sure where to start ? The folks at ESRI UK , with whom we've been working for the last year are putting on a range of FREE taster sessions over the next few weeks. They are taking place in a range of venues, and there are 2 options. 1. Face to face taster sessions Come along to one of our free GIS taster sessions and try out our GIS software, get some classroom ideas and find out what our GIS for Schools Programme has to offer. It only takes a minute to book a place. Just choose a location from the list below and click on the Book now link to register some brief details. The sessions will take place in: Birmingham King Edward VI Five Ways School , Scotland Lane, Bartley Green, Birmingham, B32 4BT Date              Wednesday 29 June 2011 Time              3:45pm - 6:00pm Location map   |   Bo...

TRF Sustainable Options View more documents from Kevin Cooper . Nice work by Kevin Cooper... Share your work via SLIDESHARE... One of the other new opportunities to contribute comes in the form of a collaborative GOOGLE DOC started by Noel Jenkins.

If you are going to be attending the BETT show at Olympia, there is a SEMINAR being delivered by Judith Mansell, Education Officer at the Royal Geographical Society. It's on the 16th of January, and starts at 3.45 pm Here are the details: Seminar Details The geography national curriculum at KS3 and subject criteria for A Level and GCSE now state that students should use new technologies including geographical information systems (GIS) to obtain, present and analyse data. The national curriculum and A Level were first taught from September 2008 so this seminar is timely. It will demonstrate to practitioners the innovative ways in which freely available online resources can easily be used to enhance the curriculum and provide relevant learning experiences and skills for 21st century. The seminar uses the GIS features of Google Earth to show how the application can enhance the three stages of fieldwork; preparation before the visit, during the visit and in the follow up analysis. Th...

Supersize Me.... Just working on FAST FOOD GIS resource for training course tomorrow... How about this for a useful starter video ?

BBC Augmented Reality GIS Demo Thanks to Ollie Bray for tip-off...

GIS (ArcView) training Wednesday, November 19, 2008   November 19, 2008 is ESRI’s international GIS day. To mark this, three innovative geography departments are offering training in their school, suitable for teachers at any level of experience with GIS. You will have a chance to see how they use ArcGIS software with pupils and to receive hands on training with GIS.   The day will run from 10am – 3.30pm and is free. To register for the event, please email the appropriate teacher. Hertfordshire Dr Peter O’Connor, Bishop’s Stortford College peter.o'connor@bishopsstortfordcollege.org Yorkshire Steve Dunn , The Grammar School at Leeds, sd@gsal.org.uk Herefordshire Jenny Barlow, Lady Hawkins School, Herefordshire jbarlow@lhs.hereford.sch.uk  

Image by USGS from HERE. Some more information on the use of GIS or Geographic Information Systems , which is part of the new KS3 PoS. As I posted earlier, I spent Friday down in London, considering the sort of questions that teachers might be asking, and where the CfBT / GA / DCSF / QCA project could help... First of all, how should we interpret what it says in the PoS. It's clear that students should actually be USING GIS , and that this should be 'throughout' the Key Stage, rather than one view of it so that a 'box can be ticked'... How can the use of GIS improve the quality of teaching and learning ? (a justification that could perhaps be used in some schools for NOT using GIS...) We started with Fred Martin, who took us through the current state of play with GIS. These first 3 slides are taken from his presentation with thanks. We then had David Rayner take us through some of the free online and software options (which are OK to get schools started...) Ruth To...

Image by me... A very pleasant day at the Royal Geographical Society on Friday for a training day for Geography Regional Subject Advisers. Thanks to Judy Mansell and co for hosting us... The day was led by the National Subject Leads: David Rayner and Ruth Totterdell, and we also had sessions from Fred Martin, who provided an excellent overview on the use of GIS, and 2 GIS providers: Diana Freeman from the Advisory Unit with AEGIS, and James Sawle from Digital Worlds. The CfBT support is focussing on the use of GIS technologies this year. If you need some support with the use of GIS in your Key Stage 3 Geography teaching. get in touch, and I'll pass you on to the relevant adviser: if you teach in the East of England , you can get support from Katharine Hutchinson and I... Perhaps the easiest thing is to have a TAXI DRIVER for a geography teacher ? According to research by University College London, they have a particular type of brain... Image from UCL via BBC website And to win...

Free GIS course at the RGS GIS made easy – 17 October at 9.50am A free one day symposium to include presentations by the OS and the RGS-IBG Education Department. Workshops led by the leading providers of GIS software and demonstrations of the free support, guidance and resources available online. Registration is free but advanced booking is required. http://www.rgs.org/gis educations@rgs.org

GA Conference materials now online at the GA website . This looks quite interesting ;)

Thanks to Noel Jenkins for flagging up this website which uses a nice GOOGLE MAPS mash-up to show house prices in areas by value... Good layers which can be made more or less transparent...

Hope to see some of you at this workshop I'm leading - though to be honest, it's Tom Biebrach and Alan Kinder who are doing all the hard work, with a lot of effort going in to make sure there's the LOFTU (don't ask...) If you use GIS, please get in touch to tell me of your experiences. a) What software do you use ? b) What problems have you had ? c) Why use GIS in the first place ? d) What are your top tips ? See some of you in Derby I hope, whether it's in the workshop or not....