Humanities

I hope you enjoy gruesome events! In history Key Stage 3 start by studying the time from 1066 – 1500. This is called Medieval Realms. We explore the Black Death and learn how to find out about the past. As the Summer approaches the focus moves to America and an investigation into Native Americans and the story of Pocahontas. We study the AQA Modern World Syllabus for GCSE; girls learn about aspects of History from the Twentieth Century, focusing on The USA: Roaring 20’s, Vietnam and Race Relations. The other aspect studied is the Cold War from the end of WW2 to the tearing down of the Berlin Wall. This is a linear approach with the examination taken in the June of Year 11.

In Religious Studies we look at a variety of religions, including Judaism, Islam and Sikhism. Christianity is the foundation of our investigations so we spend time studying the impact the Bible has had on shaping people’s lives.

We go ‘Looking for God’ in Year 9 and throughout our studies we examine our own journey of faith; asking lots of questions, listening to each other’s views.

Half the year group opts for the GCSE in which we study Ethics and Christianity. A challenging course, which involves understanding and interpreting the world we live in – and developing informed opinions for ourselves. All girls continue with General Religious Studies including topics such as the looking for happiness, crime and punishment, the existence of God and moral decision making.

We visit a NW Surrey Synagogue, Bookham Baptist Church, Shah Jahan Mosque and the Life of Christ and the GCSE group does a London Church Crawl!

There’s no chance of getting lost after studying Geography - we start by looking at where we are in the world, right down to your local area shown in detail on maps. Then it’s all about choosing a place to live and how settlements change over time. Later on, we study physical geography topics such as Rivers, Earthquakes and Volcanoes and of course we talk about the weather. We also look at less developed countries, and the role of aid, trade and Tourism in the world economy. At GCSE we study AQA B with an emphasis on challenges facing the 21st century world. This is a modular course with the first examination in Yr 10.