Geogra3: Three Geography-themed awareness days in April

In this week’s Geogra3.  I’m sharing three geographically-themed awareness days that are coming up in April that you might find useful for topical lessons, extra-curricular activities or for assemblies.

1. World Health Day 7th April #myhealthmyright

World Health Day marks the anniversary of the founding of the World Health Organisation and this year the theme is my health, my right.  As quoted on the WHO website,  

"Around the world, the right to health of millions is increasingly coming under threat.

Diseases and disasters loom large as causes of death and disability.

Conflicts are devastating lives, causing death, pain, hunger and psychological distress.

The burning of fossil fuels is simultaneously driving the climate crisis and taking away our right to breathe clean air, with indoor and outdoor air pollution claiming a life every 5 seconds."

In order to bring this focus into your lessons, you could use the resources provided by the RGS as a starting point.  They are primarily geared towards A-level students (ages 16-18) but can be adapted.  The first lesson focuses on malaria and uses a trailer from the film “Contagion” as a starter.  The second lesson focuses on non-communicable disease, specifically obesity and malnutrition.  

Alternatively, there is a useful video clip called Healthy Cities (and a longer documentary of 16 mins) available that showcases how urban governance is being used to prioritise health and well-being through civic engagement and multi-sectoral collaborations.  If you are thinking of partaking in this year's MEMF competition, designing for wellbeing in the built environment, then this could be useful to share examples of what is being done elsewhere.

2. Earth Day 22nd April #planetvsplastics

Probably the world’s largest environmental movement, this year’s theme is  Planet vs. Plastics.  The movement states the importance of the theme: unites students, parents, businesses, governments, churches, unions, individuals, and NGOs in an unwavering commitment to call for the end of plastics for the sake of human and planetary health, demanding a 60% reduction in the production of plastics by 2040 and an ultimate goal of building a plastic-free future for generations to come."  (https://www.earthday.org/planet-vs-plastics/)

There is an absolute wealth of ideas and resources to use on the Earth Day website, including the Teach-In toolkit page providing a variety of topic areas to focus on.  Or, you could head over to the education resource library and dive into the lesson plans on things like air quality or plastic pollution.  If you run an Eco club, this pdf offers a variety of projects that students could get involved in.  

3. Richter Scale Day 26th April #NationalRichterScaleDay

This day honours the birth of American seismologist and physicist Charles Richter credited for inventing the Richter Scale in 1935.  This video clip outlines the Richter Scale while this video from Simple geography shows how the Moment Magnitude scale is now more widely used for measuring earthquakes.  You could then go on to compare with the Mercalli scale as a measure of earthquake according to their observable damage.  This lesson resource on Teach It could be a suitable activity for KS3/4.       

I hope that has given you lots of inspiration, especially for those of you running Geography extra-curricular groups and I’d love to know what you get up to, so please hit reply and let me know or share in the Facebook group. 

Also, if you don’t already have it, the free 2024 Geography Awareness Days calendar can be found here.

And that's it for this week's Geogra3!

PS - I love nothing more than supporting Geography teachers as we are a pretty awesome bunch.  

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