Geography at BIS Hanoi: where students think as Global Citizens

Brian Andreas spoke insightfully when he said: “I like Geography best, because mountains & rivers know the secret; they pay no attention to boundaries”. Here at BIS Hanoi’s Geography department, our goal is to stretch the thinking of our students to believe that there are no boundaries to the ideas they can create, and the progress they can make.

We see ourselves as the flagship space within the Secondary school to explore the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - these represent the biggest issues the world faces today and we challenge our students to start thinking about how these issues could be eradicated by 2030.

Key Stage 3 (Years 7-9) Geographers are taking a break from their standard lessons this week and are applying their minds in new and creative ways. Students have been tasked with using their teamwork and communication skills to design a mobile app or traditional board game based around the SDGs. This task helps students to synthesise their existing Geographical knowledge, as well as knowledge from other subject areas, and develop risk-taking skills.

We are very excited to see how their imaginations manifest into a real-life product, especially as some students are looking at ways to embed STEAM-learning into the designs.

Continuing with the theme of the SDGs this week, IB students in Year 13 and members of the ‘Global Goals’ ECA, have been looking at the topic of ‘resource stewardship’ - how can we use our resources sustainably so that they will continue to be available for future generations? They were tasked with ranking the 17 SDGs in order of importance by creating a diamond-shape. This is quite a challenge and generated some fiery debate among members of the class who all had different ideas about what our society and planet’s most pressing issues are. The Geography department is often looking for ways to emulate facets of the IB Learner Profile, and in this instance, students were utilising their Thinking, Reflective and Communication skills.

As the academic year reaches its apex, we wish our Year 11 and 13 students well for their upcoming IGCSE and IB exams; they have worked incredibly hard for two years and deserve every success. The skills and attitudes being developed in the Geography classroom are ones that future universities and employers desire when recruiting their next cohort of applicants. We are very proud of the progress the Geographers at BIS Hanoi are making towards becoming ambitious, 21st Century-ready, internationally-minded young people.

If you thought studying Geography was simply about learning capital cities and rivers, you would be wrong!

James Forster and Jim Schofield

Geography Department