How I teach: Regenerating Places A Level

Beloved on the legacy Spec, hated on the new. Why? What is the problem with the Regenerating Places option at Edexcel A Level?

Complaints I’ve seen over the last two years include:

• It’s clearly not meant to be taught linearly unlike other topics on the Specification.

• It’s a time consumer- you’re left feeling like you’ve either not spent enough time on it or its consumed too much.

• It’s repetitious in terms of what it wants to be taught.

• Guidance on what scale of place is acceptable seems to be contradictory

• The sequencing just isn’t right. Why would you study regeneration of your local place in EQ2 and then wait to EQ4 to look at the success of it?

• Students don’t show much love for it, yet it’s a popular approach for the NEA.

I like teaching Regenerating Places. It’s not my favourite unit to teach (Carbon forever!) but it’s definitely not my least favourite. Each year I’ve taken a different approach to this unit, talked to many teachers, written many, many resources to try and help students grapple with it.

So this blog is just to give you an insight into a little of what I do at the moment and a lot of what I am going to do this year. Of course, this could be all rubbish as I am currently untested in my approach with no exams for my Year 13 cohort this year.

Introducing Key Questions at Key Stage 5

Building upon a ‘Key Ideas’ approach we developed at GCSE this year to make the Nigeria element of Changing Economic world more manageable, they are designed to follow a theme.

Our Key Questions:

Key Question 1: What makes a place successful/ unsuccessful?

Key Question 2: What is the role of the UK government in regeneration?

Key Question 3: What is the role of local government in regeneration?

Key Question 4: How do we classify our economies?

Key Question 5: How have places changed over time?

Key Question 6: Why is the lived experience such an important factor in places undergoing regeneration?

Key Question 7: Why did Newham require regeneration and what impact has it had?

Key Question 8: Why does Cornwall require regeneration and to what extent has it been successful?

I have then grouped the spec points around the Key Questions (KQ.) My students are well used to me using a wide range of spec points in our lessons and I always signpost them to them every lesson.

I am a firm believer that students should begin by looking at the concept of what can make a place successful or unsuccessful (after introducing the concept of regeneration, of course), so this would be an opportunity to start with our San Francisco Bay and Rust Belt case studies, which our students love, but has been heavily under-utilised in my previous approaches. By starting with this, we are starting the course on something appealing. Its also a great starting point for tackling 20-mark Evaluate questions.

The local and contrasting case studies

Key Question 7: Why did Newham require regeneration and what impact has it had?

Key Question 8: Why does Cornwall require regeneration and to what extent has it been successful?

I am steadfast in believing that KQ7 & 8 should close the unit. These are beasts and dominate the unit. At the same time, they cause issues by not letting other spec points be seen as important. I have had trouble before justifying this to students.

This is where our students get frustrated with the unit because the Spec doesn’t provide a good enough narrative on how it should be managed. This is the bulk of the unit and in previous years has drained most of my time and has left the other concepts being very disconnected. This approach should hopefully interleave elements from other key questions and support knowledge retrieval and understanding. Rebranding is also included here.

Key Question 2: What is the role of the UK government in regeneration?

Key Question 3: What is the role of local government in regeneration?

I have moved the idea of governance to KQ 2 and 3. This idea isn’t explored until EQ3 in the spec and I think it is such a waste, as the role of government in regeneration is very prominent in regeneration schemes. This approach will allow some familiarity to Changing Economic World from GCSE as we study infrastructure development in the UK aspect.

This then allows our students to contrast the national vs local governance approach to understand the role of different players in regeneration early on.

Key Question 5: How have places changed over time?

Key Question 6: Why is the lived experience such an important factor in places undergoing regeneration?

KQ 5& 6 allow a slow build up to KQ7 & 8, which I think is important. The lived experience is such important element but the spec has it squashed in between compulsory case studies, and I’ve always wondered if this is deliberate.

Key Question 4: How do we classify our economies?

KQ4 is the one where I’m not sure if it’s in the right place or not. In previous years, I usually started the course with these.  It could go before some of the other KQs but I like the first three KQs because they cover vast ground in what can stimulate or crash regeneration.

Issues still to resolve

• Where does the Glasgow rebranding case study come in? It is such an odd one out in what we currently do as it is usually one lesson unlike the other case studies. Can it be dissolved and the idea of urban rebranding be brought to East London/Newham?

• I’ve not let myself be guided by the Enquiry Questions. Is that too much of an issue? They are wide range and vague anyway.

• Should deprivation be a Key Question? KQ4 could be reworded to include this. It is interleaved through almost every KQ anyway.

Next Steps

To translate this into a Journey for students to use and refer to and highlight what topics comes under these KQs.

What do you think? I would love to hear your thoughts about this approach.