posted 03 June 2006 10:24 AM            

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I am intending to email Amazon.co.uk today. I have been searching for specific Geography text books and there is no mention of Geography under their sub heading of Arts and Humanities ! An omission I think needs to be rectified !

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posted 03 June 2006 10:28 AM               

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Nice one Meg!

Maybe we should be doing the 'media lessons' during geography action week. What do people think?

[This message has been edited by Daniel Raven-Ellison (edited 03 June 2006).]

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posted 04 June 2006 09:56 AM               

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'Teaching the media a lesson' might be quite hard up here in the week suggested on the blog - some Scottish local authorities have actually broken up by then. Perhaps it is something which could be done on a rolling programme over a number of months. This would have the benefit of the issue and the associated publicity being aired over a longer period of time, in a variety of locations and being covered by a range of newspapers.

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posted 04 June 2006 10:05 AM               

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Val - I think this can just be a focus week. If any schools in Scotland want to do a lesson either the week before or at ANY point in the future that would be great. As you say a rolling programme will be very useful. It would be good to have the ball rolling before the end of the year though.

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posted 04 June 2006 10:11 AM               

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Interesting slogan in Starbucks - "Geography is a flavour" and on the website - let Geography guide you to your favourite coffee http://www.starbucks.ca/en-ca/_Worlds+Best+Coffee/_Coffee+Experience/Growing+Regions.htm

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posted 04 June 2006 10:32 AM               

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Great stuff... maybe they would give us some cash to contact schools that are yet to hear of the campaign!? I'll email and ask.

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posted 04 June 2006 11:49 AM               

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Val, I think you said you'd be down south for the week 26th-30th. Where are you staying? You'd be very welcome to help me come and teach the media a lesson if you're going to be in the Cambridge area. I'm envisaging a semi-collapsed timetable with 100 Year 9 pupils playing the trade game or the Montserrat decision-making scenario (if Noel doesn't mind) for an afternoon. However, I'm yet to run this past my colleagues, the Head of Faculty or the school principal, so this could change!

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posted 04 June 2006 12:21 PM               

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I can't post on the blog, but thought you might like this scroll down
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/4333774.stm

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posted 04 June 2006 12:37 PM               

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Nice one, Tony!

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posted 04 June 2006 12:42 PM               

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Great stuff Tony!

Does anyone know of a farmer with a fallow field in a flight path (ideally Heathrow) that would let me chalk in a message?

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posted 04 June 2006 01:14 PM               

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Sorry, I can't help with that one, Dan.
Maybe we could find a school on a flightpath that would let us put a message on their playing field?

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posted 04 June 2006 01:18 PM               

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That's a good idea! Anyone have a suitable school then????

Take a look at http://www.bbc.co.uk/commissioning/contacts/index.shtml?genre=AGHNK&category=E&template=contacts.tmpl&data=contacts.dat for more people to email. These are the people who commission the programmes... conceptually these are the crucial departments I think.

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posted 04 June 2006 01:30 PM               

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Join in the discussion at http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbpointsofview/F1951574?thread=3116945&post=35958642&s_edit=yes#p35958642 to keep the issue in the eye of the BBC through 'Point of View'. You will need a free BBC Membership

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posted 04 June 2006 08:22 PM               

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"I was just watching the repeat of Coast - I thinl this and the other programmes with Nicholas Crane are Marvellous and educational view of the UK - and mianly geographical....

Well done OU"

Just posted at Points of View...http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbpointsofview/F1951574

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posted 04 June 2006 08:28 PM               

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The blog says that I now need to be signed in? Why is this? What is the password?

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posted 05 June 2006 08:20 PM               

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E-mailed local papers this morning, inviting them to watch a lesson and instead of starting reports got to thinking about less necessary things such as T shirts. Thought I could somehow get the logo on a T shirt using one of those iron on transfer thingys (Does anyone else know what I'm on about?) But when I tried to copy the logo and enlarge it, it became quite blurry. Is there a way around this? Am I overlooking something really obvious?
Anyway, suppose I should really make a start on those reports...
Jenny

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posted 05 June 2006 08:34 PM               

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Tony - I haven't had this problem, or maybe I am signed in without realising. The link from the main site seems to go to the blog witout a problem.

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posted 05 June 2006 08:52 PM               

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It's ok now Tom, I can post!

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posted 05 June 2006 09:33 PM               

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I would like to add Ottakar's to the list of media to contact. During the holidays I was browsing in the store and decided to look in the childrens section for any book bargins related to earthquakes. I finaly found a wealth of books under the heading of Science and Earth. On this shelf were also books relating to volcanoes, rainforests, weather and climate and coasts amongst many other geographical topics. It should have been labelled Geography! History, Maths, Science and MFL were all labelled correctly, so why not Geography?

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posted 06 June 2006 09:31 AM               

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I've just been in contact with my best mate from university who now works on 'The Weakest Link' as a researcher. I have told her what has been going with geography and trying to make the media aware of this issue.
As I have an issue with the media when it comes to quiz shows how often do you hear in quiz shows "geography question now...." and then all they talk about is where such and such a place is?! There is never "geography question now, what type of volcano, coastal process, river system, resources issue etc" to name a few wider topics! Geography is not just about places and regions!

Anyway, she knows and I've sent her the relevant links and hopefully something may happen. No guarentees but I've tried!

Fingers crossed!

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posted 06 June 2006 09:38 AM               

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I have emailed a friend with relevant links about this issue 'giving geography it's place in the media'.

She works on 'The Weakest link' as a researcher. My biggest issue with geography in the media is the fact that on quiz shows the only questions labelled 'geography questions' are those to do with places and regions not the wider topics covered within the curriculum.

So she's been told with relevant links and fingers crossed something happens but I can't guarentee this....anyone voluenteer for a geography teacher special?! Hahaha!

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posted 07 June 2006 04:53 PM               

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Bump....ouch!

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posted 07 June 2006 06:49 PM               

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On ‘Look East’ tonight Prince Charles was featured – apparently he has been the inspiration for a summer school that took place today at Cambridge University – for English and History teachers – about how to revive the interest of our young people in their country and culture. I’ve been a bit lazy so far, but I will start by writing to him about the role of Geography in this very important issue!

Helen

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posted 09 June 2006 06:55 PM               

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Time to get the campaign back on the front page, I think! Remember that GeoDave is not going to make his 1000th posting until there are 1000 names on the list.

How about investigating ways of sharing mailings? We are about to send a mailing to all SAGT members (1000) and I am going to slip in a GGiP flyer!

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posted 09 June 2006 06:58 PM               

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One of my school's local papers... the Henley Standard is going to do somthing for us. That's 35,000 readers and Boris Johnson has shown his support (sort of):

"Very good point!

I think you should offer your services [in reference to the paper advertising which programmes are geography] to the Henley Standard

Best,

Boris"

Val is right though... who else has access to mailings?

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posted 09 June 2006 07:14 PM              

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He should just make his 1000th post anyway, thanks for his hard work on the campaign, but will it make any difference him not posting?

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posted 11 June 2006 09:36 AM               

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Here's a simple idea that I think would work, as we need double the amount of signatures on the petition asap, which means reaching as many depts as possible without delay.
Let's just use a clear, bold FAX to as many depts as we can reach next week. It is almost impossible to get up-to-date names and e-mails of HODs, but most authorities have a Schools Directory for their area which always gives the school fax number. Every school office will have one. We would need a bold, clear A4 flyer with clear instructions at the top for the office staff to hand it to the Geography Department. The flyer could give the outline details and the web address of passion4geography.
A faxed flyer would be minimum cost, maximum reach, and depts will end up with a piece of paper (which is often less likely to get overlooked compared to an e-mail). Perhaps the flyer could be uploaded to GeoDave's site so it is accessible to all.
Then, all we need is a little army of volunteers to fax the other schools in their own local authority. It need not even have the sender's name on it, as the important thing is just to get the message into schools.
People can nominate the authority they will "do" on this thread, and it'd be very easy to map it all out as the coverage emerges.

So c'mon....this is a real opportunity for all the SLNers over the whole country, even (and perhaps especially!) those of you who have gained so much from the forum in the past but perhaps not contributed, to make a real contribution now to an excellent cause.

I will "do" Buckinghamshire.

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posted 11 June 2006 09:49 AM               

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Great idea, Chris.
I'll do Cambridgeshire.
I've emailed our AST to ask for his support with this.

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posted 11 June 2006 09:50 AM               

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Chris, I think we should include our primary colleagues in the fax campaign. What do you think?

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posted 11 June 2006 10:10 AM               

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Reaching Primary subject co-ordinators would be great, if anyone has the time to fax all primary schools as well. It's a question of the big numbers eg. there are 40 secondary schools in Bucks and about 220 Primaries, so it's a much bigger job to fax them as well, although I suppose you'd only need to sit by the fax feeding through the same bit of paper over and over to different numbers! Or bribe a son/daughter to do it!
Another approach is to see if there is any noticeboard space at your local Teaching and Learning Centre (if your authority or borough has one), where a notice can be posted. I will be putting a notice up in our centre (ideally somewhere prominent!) together with a pile of the "business cards" for teachers from all sectors to pick up when they come for courses.

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posted 11 June 2006 10:12 AM               

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I suspect that many schools are currently sending the Head of incoming Year 7 out to visit feeder schools. Perhaps they could take the flyer with them?

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posted 11 June 2006 10:25 AM               

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Great idea! Yes, using the seondary transfer process as a means of making contact with the geography primary co-ordinators would be excellent.
Also, there's nothing wrong with more than one person covering a county/borough, particularly if it's a big one. They'd just need to work collaboratively on it, decide who's doing Primary A-G, and who's doing H-M etc.
However, I still think that the Secondaries are the main target, with the clear message that we ideally need everyone in the dept. to sign, not just one person!
I'm out now for the rest of the day, but really hope to find that several areas have been "bagged" when I next log in..!

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posted 11 June 2006 11:19 AM               

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Norfolk Secondary Geography conference is on Wednesday next week.
I'm doing a session on Google Earth, and all delegates will be getting a GGIP flyer...

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posted 11 June 2006 12:32 PM               

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Does anybody have contacts with Teachers TV? Could we use this as a way of flagging up the campaign to a wider audience of geography teachers??

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posted 11 June 2006 04:27 PM               

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I'll 'do' Bridgend, Vale of Glamorgan and RCT over the next few days (exam marking season - sorry!)

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posted 11 June 2006 04:34 PM               

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I think Christine's idea is inspired and GeoDave has already put the necessary paperwork in place on the campaign website to make it easy for us all. There are fax forms to download and a form on which to 'bag' local authorities. http://www.passion4geography.co.uk/noticeboard.htm

1000 names by the end of June - come on, folks! You know you can do it.

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posted 11 June 2006 05:02 PM               

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I can't find the stuff on the noticeboard. This could easily be because I had far too much Pimms at lunchtime and can't see straight. Can anyone else find it?

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posted 11 June 2006 05:03 PM               

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I've found it now! http://www.passion4geography.co.uk/ideas.htm
I got it through the ideas page, not the noticeboard - but then it directs you to the noticeboard and its there. Very odd.

[This message has been edited by Katharine (edited 11 June 2006).]

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posted 11 June 2006 09:27 PM               

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Starbucks has an advertising campaign with a big Geography headline re; coffee beans in their stores

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posted 12 June 2006 10:39 AM               

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I've got half a class syndrome this week as a lot of Year 8 are out on a trip... am thinking of getting them involved in the campaign. Writing letters unless anyone can think of a more exciting way?!? There's a challenge! I've got about 12-15 in both a mid set and a top set (very much high fliers)... Have them Wednesday & Thursday for one lesson each.

Katherine, give me a shout if you want help with Cambs or if we could combine efforts somehow...

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