A few more bits for you...

Sorry to keep you waiting for the next few questions, and to disturb you when "Britain's Got Talent" is on...
Here's the next task...

Imagine you're a...

(this is a common type of question on the Pilot exam..)

Imagine you're an advertising agency who has been asked to come up with a print ad aimed at attracting customers back to Broadmead.
Write a 60 word advertisement "selling" the Broadmead experience.

Next....

OK. So today's little task uses the responses to questions of a number of shoppers at Broadmead and the Mall.

1. Why do some people like out of town shopping centres but others don't ? (4)
2. Where would YOU prefer to shop and why ? (3)
3. Imagine you had the job of persuading customers to come back to Broadmead. Your target audience will be the customers you identified in question 1.
Make a list of the main difficulties you need to overcome to get these customers back, and suggest some changes that could be made in the Broadmead area (8)

Take a look at the pictures HERE to get a feeling for what is ACTUALLY being done in Broadmead to help bring people back.

What the pre-release materials don't mention is that there is already a major redevelopment of Bristol's CBD going on.
It's called CABOT CIRCUS, and the pictures above shows some of the changes in the area. Flickr once again has some great images of these developments.

Some WEBCAM views here (it was a bit misty in Bristol when I looked...) - POST A COMMENT to let me know what the weather was like when you had a look...

The Devel wears Primark

Thanks to John Barlow for sending an advance preview of this programme, which is due to be broadcast on Sunday on Channel 4.

Channel 4 Sunday 1 June 2008 9pm

Sales of cheap High Street fashion are booming, but is there a terrible price to be paid for £2 t-shirts and £8 dresses?

Presenter and former fashion model Alexa Chung sets out to uncover what conditions are really like in some of the Indian factories that supply the UK’s leading budget clothes retailer, Primark.

And to find out what life is really like for those making our bargain clothes, Alexa sets up her own fashion ‘sweat shop’ in London’s West End staffed by 15 volunteer members of the public, all budget fashion-lovers.

Using undercover filming, and talking to current and former factory workers, The Devil Wears Primark discovers a number of breaches of Primark’s own ethical Code of Conduct at some of its Indian suppliers and their sub-contractors, including unsafe and unhygienic conditions, workers forced to work overtime for no pay, verbal abuse and even possible child labour.

The investigation questions Primark’s claims to enforce their own code. And in the UK, the programme shows that staff are giving customers inaccurate information about the provenance of Primark clothes and conditions in factories supplying the retailer.

Conditions in Alexa’s fashion ‘sweatshop’ are based on those uncovered in India; in uncomfortably hot and humid conditions, the volunteers work up to 70 hours each in five days, earning on average only 15p per hour.

But after their experiences, how will the budget fashion-lovers feel about buying bargain clothes on the High Street?

Looks like Year 10 pupils should set their videos for this one.

If you haven't already done so, have a go at the TEACHER INVADERS game.

Teacher Invaders

You will have seen me use several of Andrew Field's CONTENT GENERATOR creations in lessons this year: these FLASH based animations include HALF A MIN, and the PENALTY SHOOTOUT creator.
Andrew has just launched the FREE BETA of his latest TEACHER INVADERS game, which can even be uploaded to VLEs (KES is due to have a Virtual Learning Environment from September)

Tony has already created a quick 20 question quiz for his PILOT groups, so I had a go just now. Click the image below (borrowed from Tony - thanks!) to start the quiz. There are 28 questions which relate to the information in the pre-release booklet.

When you've finished, ADD A COMMENT, with your KNOWLEDGE PERCENTAGE, and your POINTS SCORE, or e-mail with a screenshot - first KES student to do this gets a special prize after half term.

And I hope you're reading these posts DANIELLE !

Pre-Release

A typical Bank Holiday: windy and damp...

Here's a few tasks for you to do to while away the minutes...

1. Look at Resource 4: the Tax Disc survey...

a) What data did the students collect ?
b) Why would they want to know this information ?
c) Is the data they collected accurate ?
d) What problems are there with using this method of collecting data about where people have travelled from ?
[5 marks]


Here's a useful video to watch to get across the importance of CONSUMPTION of the World's economy. If you follow the link you can watch the rest of the excellent STORY OF STUFF...
It lasts just over 6 minutes, and will make you think... A bit USA centred, but then it was produced in the USA after all...



99% of everything bought in the USA is 'trash' within 6 months...

Quick Quiz

Thanks to Tony Cassidy for this find. Just put this together...



Thanks to 'Bobbyrocks' for spotting the deliberate mistake...
Good to see that people are playing the quiz !

Pre Release 2008 Cont.

Here's todays little task - after all, it's going to be wet and windy tomorrow...

1. What is the shopping area near Bristol's CBD called ? (1)
2. What is the equivalent area in King's Lynn called ? (1)
3. What direction is Cribb's Causeway from the CBD ? (1)
4. How far is it from Cribb's Causeway to the CBD in a straight line, and along the A4018 ? (2)

Half term and Work Experience

OK.
So it's the big break now...
It's VITAL that you check in here regularly over the next 3 weeks. I will post a small item each day to keep you ticking over. You'll need to use your booklet and pre-release support booklet to answer the questions and think about the key issues I mention.
Today we were writing a draft letter to the headteacher to suggest that he stock school uniform that was Fairtrade and/or organic certified...

Here goes with the first post...
Look at Resource 1 on page 4 of the booklet.

1. What country, region and county is Bristol located in ? (3 marks)
2. Name the river that flows through Bristol (1 mark)
3. How far are London, Birmingham, Exeter and King's Lynn from Bristol in a straight line ? (4 marks)
4. How would a mobile phone made in Germany be transported to be sold in a shop in Bristol ? (2 marks)
5. How would a t-shirt made in Lesotho be transported to be sold in a shop in Bristol ? (2 marks)
6. What do the letters CBD stand for ? (1 mark)
7. Whereabouts in Bristol is its CBD ? (2 marks)

TOTAL: 15 marks

Fairtrade, Cooperatives and Organic

Thanks to Tony C for providing the backbone for today's lesson, which referred to the final source, and followed on from the video we started to watch last week.

The final source is an ad for a company called HUG, who sell clothing which is "ethically traded".

Click the logo above to go to the HUG website...

A reminder that FAIRTRADE and ORGANIC are separate labels, but may be applied together in some situations.

Useful websites:

FAIRTRADE FOUNDATION

SOIL ASSOCIATION

Question for the potential 'A' grade students (and others who are aiming high...)

Should air freighted food still be classed as organic ? Read the discussions HERE.

Examples of SOCIAL PREMIUMS from Fairtrade ?

The DUBBLE site has some more examples, and also some good FAIRTRADE resources.

• Medical Care: paying for health worker, clinic etc.



• Improving roads



• Sinking a new well



• Education: school building, resources, teachers



• Access to radio broadcasts - wind up radios etc.



• Solar powered storage for vaccines etc.

Also don't forget to book your activities for Activities Days Year 10.

Can I recommend Geo Earth Explorers on the Thursday. It's my favourite price: FREE.

You will have the chance to explore the Earth with Google Earth on the Interactive Whiteboards, and help produce some nice new display materials ready for September and the new school year.

We also finish nice and early - well, you don't want to overdo it just before the summer holiday do you ?

Exam Advice (Continued)

1. Use the RESOURCES that the exam paper tells you to.
2. PRIORITISE: concentrate your time appropriately
3. JUSTIFY: if you are making a point, back it up with a particular resource
4. Don't just come to a conclusion without comparing BOTH SIDES (if there are more than one...)
5. Make sure that any key words are spelled the same on your exam script as they are on the exam paper.

You should all be aiming for a minimum grade C, and those doing the Higher Paper should be aiming for a grade A.

Pre Release 2008

The first of a series of posts which will take you through the booklet ready for the exam.

There are 3 sections which relate to the 3 pieces of work that we did.

MY PLACE
Where is Bristol ? What is Bristol ?
How is Bristol linked to the rest of the UK ?
What is Bristol like as a place to live in ? How does it compare with King's Lynn ?

PEOPLE AS CONSUMERS: the impact of our decisions
Why do people visit Cribb's Causeway ?
Where do they come from ?
What impact has the development of the mall had on the surrounding area, and the centre of Bristol ?
What fieldwork could YOU carry out to investigate opinions about the newly developed Vancouver Centre in King's Lynn ?
Why are so many of the products purchased in shops in the UK made in LEDCs ?
What is organic farming ?
Why do increasing numbers of consumers buy organic products ?
Who would you persuade people to pay a little extra to buy organic and/or Fairtrade products

Remember: organic and Fairtrade are not the same thing...

What is Fairtrade ?
How would you organise a Fairtrade campaign in school ?

EXTREME ENVIRONMENTS
What is Greenland ? Where is Greenland ?
What makes Greenland / Svalbard extreme ?
Why do Greenland / Svalbard inspire awe and wonder ?
How are the landscapes of the places similar ?
What are the challenges of working and living in Greenland ?
How do plants and animals survive in Greenland ?
How have physical processes changed the landscape in Greenland and Svalbard ?
How might Greenland change in the future ? (relate to the work that we did on the Future for Svalbard ?)

THE KEY CONCEPTS...
FUGIS

FUTURES: What is the future for the Arctic ?

UNEVEN DEVELOPMENT: How are the clothing / mobile phone factory similar / different ?

GLOBALISATION: How is the future of the Gwich'n people threatened by the oil industry ? What links people in the UK with products made in cheaper locations ?

INTERDEPENDENCE: How are we as consumers linked to other people / places in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world: particularly LESOTHO, GREENLAND and the places on the map in the centre of the booklet.

SUSTAINABLE: Is the Mall / Broadmead / Growth in Organic Farming / Fairtrade sustainable ?

KEY COMMAND WORDS
DESCRIBE
EXPLAIN
DISTRIBUTION
COMPARE
CONSIDER
PRODUCT WEB
INVESTIGATE

Thanks once again to Penny Parry for the structure for this and future posts on the pre-release materials...

Some exam details...

Farewell to Year 11s - enjoy the 'prom' tonight...

Thanks to my colleague Penny Parry from Rosemary Musker School for her booklet which I shall be using over the next few weeks with Year 10s...
Remember that the exam is on the 24th of June in the AFTERNOON session
It should take place in the Sports Hall, but I'll let you know if there's any change to that...
You will need to bring a BLACK BIRO to write with...

More pre-release posts to come over the weekend...

More of Konnie

Some more Sky Learning Revision videos with Konnie Huq can be seen by following the link to SKY LEARNING.

Our Big Fairtrade Adventure for Year 10

In last week's classroom lesson, we were looking at the similarities and differences between the two factories that were in the pre-release booklet: the textiles factory in Lesotho, and the Nokia mobile phone factory.
Tomorrow, we will be using a programme that was broadcast on Channel 4 a month or so back.
It's called "Our Big Fairtrade Adventure" and follows 3 students from a school in Oxfordshire who go to India to try to source an organic and fairtrade school uniform shirt.

We'll use some resources kindly produced by two of my online colleagues: Mr. Rayner's powerpoint, and Miss Walters' question paper, as well as the programme itself.
This will get us thinking about the conditions for the producers of products that we use everyday, and what we can do about it. It demonstrates the concept of INTERDEPENDENCE: that we are connected to people in other parts of the world by our actions, and also the idea of People as Consumers: what we choose to buy makes a difference to other people.

Svalbard: Polar Bears listed as threatened

The United States has listed the Polar Bear as a threatened species due to the decline in Arctic Sea Ice according to this BBC ARTICLE.
This means that one possible FUTURE that we suggested may well be a step closer to coming true...

Konnie's Revision Tips

Got an e-mail from Sky Learning to ask me to tell you all about a new video guide to revision they've put together...
Here's a video... (but not if you're looking at school...)

Pre Release 2008 Post 1 - Work for Tuesday 13th

Flickr User: Joe Dunckley - kindly made available via Creative Commons
Development work at Broadmead Shopping Centre

This is the first of many posts relating to the Pre Release booklet for the Year 10 Pilot examination.

These will continue for the next 2 weeks of term, but crucially, through the half term holiday and the two weeks of WORK EXPERIENCE.
It is important that you come back at the end of Work Experience having done a short section of preparation each day...The first post relates to the FIRST PART of the booklet.
Look at the images above, which are of BROADMEAD shopping centre in Bristol.
This has just had a lot of money spent on it, perhaps to allow it to compete with CRIBBS CAUSEWAY: an Out of Town shopping centre.

Remember the old joke: If you've seen one out of town shopping centre, you've seen "a mall"....
(OK, so I had to explain it to some of you....)

COVER WORK FOR 13th MAY: Apologies for absence - I'm down at the Royal Geographical Society today, so it's for a good Geographical reason...

1. How does Broadmead compare to the MALL ?
2. Why did it need to be redeveloped ?
3. Visit the BROADMEAD website and build up a comparison table between the 2 locations.
4. How easy is it to get to each of the 2 locations ? - Use the DESTINATION BROADMEAD site.
5. How have CBDs changed over the last decade ?
6. Compare BROADMEAD with the new VANCOUVER SHOPPING CENTRE in King's Lynn - source 2 images of King's Lynn's new shops and annotate them as much as possible - paste them into powerpoint and use callouts to add the labels...
7. Below is a picture of Norfolk Street (in King's Lynn) - how do the shops on this type of street differ from those in the very centre of town ? What has happened to the shops in this image in the last six months ?
8. What changes would you expect to happen in this area in the future ?
   

Image by Flickr user Joseph McGarraghy

Do they mean us ?

A new tourist guide to the UK has been produced, and it includes some surprising (perhaps) descriptions of the country and its population.

The BBC ARTICLE includes some extracts from the updated ROUGH GUIDE.

What image does this give of ENGLAND.

Some amusing HAVE YOUR SAY comments already available.
Some of these pick up on CULTURAL ASPECTS of the UK, which would be useful for Year 11s for next year (pay attention Year 10s)

What do you think about these examples from the HAVE YOUR SAY section...
Which one would you MOST or LEAST agree with ?

1. Bacon butties, Sunday roast and chicken tikka massala

2. They missed out, uncouth, uncivil, uneducated, unmannered & prone to mindless street violence prefaced by the words "Wot you lookin at!!" I'd say that most of the world see's us like this, not the 'civilised islands of culture' that the BBC, and this Government like to portray as "This England" whilst happily lowering standards in all walks of life in the name of equality!

3. I think they have it pretty sussed, people buy all these trashy z list celeb mags why ill never know. they are a total waste of trees. People cant go out for a couple of drinks and act normally people just go out to get drunk because their lives are so sad and pathetic. Great britain certainly isnt great any longer

4. For all our overweight, binge-drinking, celebrity-obsessed TV addicts this is still the greatest country on earth. The people are second to none and sure we might not all agree on everything but they`re OUR people to fight with and nobody elses. And watch us all pull together in a crisis. What we have is unique in the world, heritage, history, the london taxi cab, the monarchy, the country pub, amazing countryside, bluebells, morris dancers, the list goes on. Be proud of who and what you are.

5. It describes a minority, the sort they love to parade on TV as though they are typical of society and if you're any different you're tragically old-fashioned.It doesn't describe the majority, who are still hard-working, decent, quiet people - you just don't hear about them, and they assist by not being natural attention-seekers.All nations have both types, it's not unique to England. This is just a cheap publicity stunt for the book. It won't make me feel ashamed to be English.

Up to 100 000 people killed ?

By Flickr user TZA (Creative Commons) - image credit Google and associated imaging partners

Sustainable Transport

A recent BBC NEWS story about a car cum plane....

Make sure that you have given me ALL THE AVAILABLE COURSEWORK by Friday at the latest. Some of the folders are still looking a little sparse to be honest....

Year 11 and Year 10 FINAL CALL !

Need the final work from you for portfolio by Friday at the absolute latest.

Final additions to tasks.
The FUGIS mapping for Year 10's

The MULTIMEDIA PIECES by Year 11 - a lot of you will lose a lot of marks without these - please make sure I have them...

A new patriotism...

Coming to the end of 'Real England' which I've blogged about several times before...
Good paragraph in final chapter...
"We need, perhaps, a new type of patriotism, benign and positive, based on place not race, geography not biology. One which seeks to make the best of what we are and what we have. A national mission to reclaim the land and the landscapes for all the people who live in them and care about them."

Also check out "Flood", starting at 8.05 tomorrow on ITV, continuing at 9pm on Monday...

Final submissions...

Hope you're all having a nice Bank Holiday so far !
Just been sitting in the sun marking coursework so far, and some folders need a little more input. Make sure you haven't got any other bits sitting in your book, or on your home PC, or Flash drive that I can have on Tuesday so that I can give you the maximum credit that you deserve...

Remember the list that I posted last week - have you REALLY done ALL of those things ?
(Hint: the answer for some of you is "No"....)

Getting close to Study Leave

Best wishes to all Year 11 for their summer exams.

Hope that Year 10 exams have been going well too.
Remember that you miss a session on Friday because of exams.

Don't forget to keep checking Tony's blog for Pre-release updates: a new powerpoint on the Clothing section has just been added...

Final additions for Year 11

Final additions - do you have all of these in the folder ?
We've been asking for these for some considerable time. Please make sure that we have them by the end of the week, as this weekend will be spent marking and preparing folders.

Magazine
Contents page ?
Full definition of sustainability – linked to transport.
Some mention of recent problems with fuel prices, which are another reason for finding alternatives.
A map of King’s Lynn showing what you intend to do to sort out problem areas of the town.
Some examples from other places of attempts to make transport more sustainable ?
Acknowledgements of sources of information ?

Multicultural UK
Full definition of multicultural.
Some examples of what makes UK multicultural ?
Time line of previous arrivals of migrants ?
Reason behind recent arrivals ?
Your opinion, balanced with the 'good' and 'bad' outcomes
What might happen next ?

Globalisation
Full definition of globalisation ?
Explanation of global culture.
Printout of your cultural objects with an explanation of the task, and what geographical bias you noticed.
Some suggestions of where local culture is being replaced by global culture.
Some suggestions of where local culture is fighting back against global culture

Remember the wider definition of culture.

Multimedia Presentation
Dn't want to see any more random Google searching for images of King's Lynn - that isn't what I need at this point...
Need a contribution from you which demonstrates your view of a particular aspect of King's Lynn's cultural landscape, and an appreciation that you realise that not everyone will see the town in the same way: think of how some of these people might view the town: tourists, young people, homeless people, recent arrivals from Europe, old people who've lived in the town all their lives...
You have had 6 weeks to interview people, take images etc.

The Year 11 work is worth 50% of your mark...
Final chances now for honing your final submissions....

And finally:
Check your exercise book - is there anything that could be neatly cut out and incorporated into any of these above pieces as an appendix or supplementary sheet...