Case study 5: investigating sustainable urban development  

Sprowston Community High SchoolNorwich, Norfolk

Year 8 Summer term 2008

(1) What was the department trying to achieve?

• The geography department at Sprowston wanted to make full use of the opportunities within the 2008 Programme of Study for Key Stage 3

• The teachers decided fieldwork was an ideal means of addressing aspects of the Importance Statement – using enquiry to encourage ‘questioning, investigation and critical thinking about issues affecting…people’s lives, now and in the future’ and focusing on a local housing development scheme to raise ‘awareness of sustainable development … differing points of view people hold and possible conflicts’

• By the end of an investigation, they wanted pupils to:– be comfortable collecting data independently– give their own opinions on features they observe first hand– make suggestions for improvements or changes– apply the idea of sustainable development

(2) How did the teachers organise the learning?

• Students’ prior understanding of sustainable housing was determined by annotating a cartoon of a typical suburban house

• Carefully scaffolded fieldwork strategies were developed to promote independence during a local fieldtrip to observe current housing and a potential site for future development

• After the fieldtrip, students drew plans and made models of a new development, applying their ideas about sustainable living

Strategy 1: assessing the level of prior understanding

• To introduce the investigation a cartoon of a typical suburban house was presented to students• After discussion, students assessed the sustainability of the housing by highlighting features and annotating the cartoon• Further discussion was used to embed the concept of sustainability• The example here shows one student’s work and indicates awareness of sustainable energy use around the home

Strategy 2: investigating sustainability in the field

• The following three slides show techniques used to investigate the concept of sustainability in the field

• The emphasis is on making observations and judgments and deepening understanding

• The tasks were carefully scaffolded to allow students to work independently. They were encouraged to draw conclusions for themselves.

• In the photo survey, students were able to select their own views to pick our sustainable or unsustainable features of housing

• The environmental survey prompted them to observe additional features

• The interpretation task developed their understanding of sustainability by asking them to relate specific features of the environment to the concept of a sustainable community

Photo 1

Describe what your photo shows…

Why did you choose this photo?...

Does it show sustainable development?

How could it be improved?

Photographic Survey

Photo 2

Describe what your photo shows…

Why did you choose this photo?...

Does it show sustainable development?

How could it be improved?

Photo 3

Describe what your photo shows…

Why did you choose this photo?...

Does it show sustainable development?

How could it be improved?

Environmental Survey of Housing Estate at Sprowston

Litter

Parking

Range of sized housing

Range of design

Parking

Trees

Cycle Paths

Litter bins

Bus Stops

Bus Frequency

Solar Panels

Neighbourhood watch

Street lights

Burglar Alarms

Double Glazing

General environment

Natural Habitats

Open Spaces

School nearby

Shops nearby

Other………………

1. Grade each part of the Environment survey from +5 = very good/lots of to -5 = poor/not a lot of this by putting a star in the correct place along the scale

2. What are the best features of the estate?……………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………….....……………………………………………………………….

3. What are its worst features?……………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………….....……………………………………………………………….

4. What could be done to improve this housing estate?……………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………….....……………………………………………………………….

5. Take photos of these things and any thing else important linked to what the housing estate is like, good or bad.

Very Good Av. Very Poor +5 +4 +3 +2 +1 0 -1 -2 -3 -4 -5

Environmental Survey Interpretation

+5 +4 +3 +2 +1 Good Bad -1 -2 -3 -4 -5

Litter

Parking

Range of sized housing

Range of design

Parking

Trees

Cycle Paths

Litter bins

Bus Stops

Bus Frequency

Solar Panels

Neighbourhood watch

Street lights

Burglar Alarms

Double Glazing

General environment

Natural Habitats

Open Spaces

School nearby

Shops nearby

Other……….

Litter

Parking

Range o

Range o

Parking

Trees

Cycle Paths

Litter bins

Bus Stops

Bus Fre

Solar Panels

Neighbou

Street lights

Burglar Alarms

Double Gla

General

Natural Habi

Open Spaces

School nearby

Litter

Parking

Range o

Range o

Parking

Trees

Cycle Paths

Litter bins

Bus Stops

Bus Fre

Solar Panels

Neighbou

Street lights

Burglar Alarms

Double Gla

General

Natural Habi

Open Spaces

School nearby

Using your Environmental Survey results, complete the scale on the left using suitable

pictogram symbols to show each score

Briefly describe your results and explain how the area could be improved..

 Strategy 3: communicating ideas

about sustainability

• After the field excursions, students took part in a decision-making exercise to select the most sustainable way of developing new housing in their local community

• They produced maps and models to communicate their ideas. These were based on a critical analysis of their experience in the field

You will use the following skills completing the fieldwork and assessment. How did it go?

Need more practise

Environmental survey and analysis of estate

You could score the area and make a judgement with reasons on the area

Photos You can use relevant photos to help make judgements

Field sketch You were able to draw the area with labels

Os maps direction and distance

You were able to use the OS map accurately

SWOT You could analyse the area for new housing

Describe /

Explain

You were able to use words to say what and why

Using collected Primary Data

You could produce graphs and describe them from the data collected

Sustainable Plan

You could suggest sustainable ideas and explain them for future housing

(3) How well did the teachers achieve their

aims?• Students self-assessed their fieldwork and associated research skills

• These skills also underpinned the teacher-assessed outcomes for the investigation

• Students across the attainment range were able to access the tasks and work independently in the field

• This student selected different features in his photographs and wrote independently about them

• He applied several aspects of sustainability to his explanations, including environmental and social sustainability

• This student was able to independently assess a wide range of sustainability measures for the local community, based on field observations

• His observations led to him begin to make appropriate suggestions for making the area more sustainable

• By the end of the investigation, students were able to generate their own design ideas for sustainable housing in the local area

• These ideas were a combination of critical thinking based on first-hand observation and creative thinking drawing on secondary sources