Key Stage 1 geography · Place knowledge

KS1 geography: a contrasting non-European country

As well as a small area of the UK, Key Stage 1 children study a small area in a contrasting country outside Europe. They look at its human and physical geography, using the same simple vocabulary as for home, and find out how daily life there is similar to and different from their own. The aim is a fair, specific picture of a real place, which guards against children forming a single story about a whole continent.

A contrasting place abroad, explained

The National Curriculum does not name the country. Schools choose a small area in a country outside Europe that contrasts clearly with the UK in its climate, landscape or way of life, and which a teacher can teach confidently. Choices vary widely. Some schools study a village in Kenya, some a town in India, others somewhere in Brazil, Jamaica or Australia. The school’s choice may also reflect pupils’ families or links with a partner school.

The key idea is “small area”. Children are not learning about a whole country, which would be too big and too varied to describe in a few sentences. They study one village, a stretch of coast or part of a city, using photographs, maps, stories, film and, where possible, contact with someone who lives there. They find the country on a globe or atlas, name its continent, and then look closely at the place itself.

Children use the same vocabulary as in their study of home. Physical features might include hills, a river, a coast, soil, vegetation, the weather and the seasons. Human features might include houses, shops, markets, farms, schools and roads, and what the buildings are made of. They notice how climate shapes daily life: what people wear, what crops can grow, how houses are built, and how children travel to school.

Teachers also take care over how the place is presented. A good study shows ordinary life: school, food, work, play, family. It does not reduce a place to one picture of poverty or wildlife, and it does not say that “everyone in” the country lives in one way. At this age, a good outcome is a child who can name the country and its continent, describe a few physical and human features accurately, and say what is similar to and different from home.

Words your child will hear

Contrasting: Very different from something else. A contrasting place has different weather or landscape from home.
Country: A place with its own borders and capital city, such as Kenya or Brazil.
Continent: One of the seven very large areas of land on Earth. Africa is a continent, not a country.
Climate: The usual weather in a place over many years.
Market: A place where people gather to buy and sell food and other goods.
Similar: Alike in some way.
Different: Not the same.

What the National Curriculum says

The programme of study for Key Stage 1 says:

Pupils should be taught to understand geographical similarities and differences through studying the human and physical geography of a small area of the United Kingdom, and of a small area in a contrasting non-European country
Pupils should develop knowledge about the world, the United Kingdom and their locality.
Pupils should be taught to use basic geographical vocabulary to refer to: key physical features and key human features

Objectives from the National Curriculum in England, © Crown copyright, used under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Try it: describing a place from a photograph

A photograph shows a village in the hills of Kenya. There are small fields of maize and bananas, a red dirt road, houses with metal roofs, a market stall under a tree and a distant mountain. How would you describe the place?

Find the place first. Use a globe to find Kenya. It is a country in Africa, and the Equator crosses it. Say “Kenya is a country in the continent of Africa.”
Name the physical features. The hills, the mountain and the red soil were made by nature. The maize and bananas are plants, but people planted them as crops, which is why the fields count as human.
Name the human features. The houses, the dirt road, the fields and the market stall were made or arranged by people.
Look for clues about the weather. Crops are growing, so there must be enough rain at some time of year. Sunshine and shadows suggest it is warm. Say this is a guess, not a fact.
Say one thing that is similar and one that is different from home. Similar: people live in houses and buy food. Different: the soil is red and the fruit growing is banana.

This is a hilly farming village in Kenya, in Africa. It has physical features such as hills and red soil, and human features such as houses, fields and a market. People here grow crops such as maize and bananas and buy and sell food at the market.

Common mistakes and how to help

Saying “Africa” as if it were a single country

Stories and charity appeals often say “Africa” when they mean a particular place. Africa is a continent with more than 50 countries.

What helps: Always say the country and the area. “We are looking at a village in Kenya, which is in Africa.” Find both on the globe.

Thinking everyone there lives the same way, or that everyone is poor

A small number of images are used again and again, so children build one picture. But people live in cities, towns and villages and in many different ways, like at home.

What helps: Look at several pictures, including a busy town, a school and a family at home. Talk about how one place can contain lots of different lives.

Treating the other place as strange or the opposite of home

Children notice differences first, such as the weather or the clothes, and may forget that people everywhere go to school, cook meals and play.

What helps: Ask for the similarities before the differences. People everywhere share a lot of daily life: meals, school, work, play and family.

Generalising from one photograph

A single picture shows one moment in one spot. A rainy season picture and a dry season picture of the same village can look quite different.

What helps: Ask “What might this look like in another season? What can’t we see?” Looking at more than one image is a good habit for a geographer.

How to help at home

Find the place together. Whichever country your child is studying, find it on a globe or map. Say its continent and which oceans or seas are nearby, and work out which way you would travel from home.
Read stories set there. Look for picture books and folk tales set in or written by people from the country. Stories give children a sense of everyday life, food and families that facts alone cannot.
Cook or taste something from the place. Try a simple recipe or fruit from the country, with an adult doing any cutting or cooking. Look at the packaging to see where it was grown and find that on the map.
Compare a day. Ask “What might a child there do in a day?” and compare with yours: waking up, travelling to school, meals, playing. Find similarities first, then differences.
Check what the weather is like there today. Look at a weather report for the area, or talk about the typical weather. Compare it with the weather outside your window and think about how it changes what people wear and do.

Leads on to

Key Stage 2: A region of the United Kingdom
Key Stage 2: A region in a European country
Key Stage 2: A region in North or South America