Where has our love of geography gone?

At first sight, there is no obvious connection between their trip next week and what our TV screens have been full of for the past 10 days.

With the breaking news of an earthquake in Kashmir, within hours there were pictures of mourning mothers screaming, bodies being hauled from rubble and thousands left homeless.

This could have been anywhere. Replace earthquake in Pakistan with hurricane in Central America, tsunami in Indonesia or floods in New Orleans.

Grimly, 2005 is starting to be called the year of the natural disaster and television brings these victims closer than ever before.

Natural disasters horrify and fascinate us - so why are fewer and fewer children studying geography at school? Why are information technology and business studies more important than learning where Kashmir is on the map, or how fault lines beneath the Earth's surface can have such a devastating effect?

It's not that geography is less important, it's just seen as less fashionable, says Lee Norster, head of the subject at Pershore High School.

"There's tremendous pressure on geography at the moment. We have the challenge to make it relevant and to make it interesting," he says.

"Students have been preferring to study subjects like ICT. Our aim, therefore, is to bring those elements into geography. We now use the internet a lot, engage in digital projects, and look at photos and news articles."

Geography has been described as the education system's 'lost subject'.

Statistics just out show that only four per cent of teaching time is spent on geography in an average primary school, which roughly equates to one 55-minute lesson per week. It is hardly surprising then, that by the time they reach GCSE level, students are ignoring the subject altogether.

It is for that reason that the Government has set up a working party, chaired by the Schools Minister Lord Adonis, to address the problem of the continuing decline.

The survey was carried out by a team at the University of Manchester. Senior researcher Joanna Bragg says: "Schools have now embedded the national literacy and numeracy strategies. The Government has pushed ICT and PE. Other subjects, like geography, art, history and music, have lost out."

At Pershore, Mr Norster is helping to reverse that decline. The school now has record numbers taking geography. Where A-level classes once struggled to attract more than a dozen students, 40 are studying the course this year.

"Often geography was seen as a subject where non-specialist teachers could just fill the gaps," he says. "Now we have specialist teachers and we are really raising the profile by organising more field trips and making sure geography is as interesting and just as relevant as those other subjects."

And if swimming in geothermal springs and walking on glaciers in Iceland sounds like a rather nice holiday, well that's the secret.

GCSE students Izzy Sanders and Sam Peirce can't wait for the field trip and they do see the relevance of geography.

"In maths you learn about equations and you think, 'What's the point?' says Sam. "At least in geography you can see what makes a volcano erupt and why people die as a result."

The Government's working party demonstrates a realisation that, next time people die in a far-flung country on a massive scale, there has to be more people, like Sam and Izzy, enthused about geography and who want to understand.

And it might do us all a bit of good to check exactly where on the globe Islamabad is. Or indeed, Reykjavik.

Because, as Izzy points out: "Geography is all about learning facts which are relevant to the world. And the hot springs sound great."

TEST YOUR GCSE GEOGRAPHY KNOWLEDGE

Here are some sample GCSE geography questions. See how you would fare:

1. Most people are killed in earthquakes in less economically developed countries because:

(a) building standards are low

(b) towns and cities are well prepared for earthquakes

(c) earthquakes happen more frequently than in more economically developed countries

2. What scale is used to measure the strength of earthquakes?

(a) Beaufort scale

(b) Richter scale

(c) Lime scale

3. When people have no choice but to move, eg. Albanians in Kosovo, what is this called?

(a) Voluntary migration

(b) Forced migration

(c) Rural to urban migration

4. The main human cause of flooding in the South Asian country of Bangladesh is:

(a) Afforestation

(b) Deforestation

(c) Heavy monsoon rains

Source: www.geography.learnontheinternet.co.uk

BLACKBOARD

Teachers jobs at risk in row over funding

SCHOOLS which overclaimed millions of pounds in Government funding have been told to give it back, putting teachers' jobs at risk.

Auditors discovered around half the schools they checked had overstated the number of sixth-form students they were teaching.

Experts said the "astonishingly high" levels of over-claiming - in which some schools received over £100,000 more than they were due - should prompt reforms to the way sixth-forms are funded.

Heads warned that teachers would inevitably lose their jobs and sixth-forms may even face closure as offending schools have their budgets cut next year.

The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) distributes £1.8bn of Government funds to school sixth forms every year based on pupil numbers.

Schools get between £3,500 and £4,500 for each pupil.

But when the LSC audited nearly 300 schools over the spring and summer - about one sixth of those it funds - it found about 50 per cent had claimed too much money, while "a smaller proportion" underestimated their pupil numbers and would be in line for more funding.

Poster power

SCHOOLS in Worcestershire may put up signs warning parents and pupils that violence against staff will not be tolerated.

The National Association of Head Teachers, the country's biggest heads' union, has sent posters to its 30,000 members amid continuing fears over poor behaviour in our schools. The poster states that anyone behaving aggressively is likely to be thrown off the premises and prosecuted.

The NAHT said it was intended as "a warning of the consequences of violent and abusive behaviour" and a reassurance to staff and children that their schools will be safe.

Tom's president

THE headteacher of Sladen CE Middle School in Kidderminster, Tom Revell, has been elected as president of the West Midlands region of the National Association of Head Teachers.

Mr Revell has been president of the Worcestershire branch of NAHT for several years.