The Worldwise Quiz has been around for decades. A number of quiz books have been published over the years: small format books which I had copies of in my filing cabinet when teaching. Worldwise connects with other GA activity in the same way as the Quality Marks cut across several strands of GA support. It was developed by Rex Walford.
Details of how to enter the competition, and also some sample quiz questions are available to download from here.
Worldwise also feeds in to the International Geographical Olympiad. (See Sue Lomas' entry for more on this, and also Mark Higginbottom)
Jeremy Krause gave me his thoughts on the developments:
2015 Mark Higginbottom who used part his Presidential Address to share his ideas and experiences of the Worldwise programme. This was about students and them learning geography. That has been at the heart of the GA since 1893. Mark with Sue Lomas have been the driving force behind the ‘Worldwise’ programme which focuses on developing school students’ skills and knowledge of Geography. This has been a massive commitment for them in terms of time and energy in the UK and overseas. They have made this highly successful programme one of the GA’s jewels.
Worldwise also connects with Worldwise Week (WWW)
WWW is linked with the theme of the yearly conference.
You can download the packs from previous years going back to 2007. I recommend doing this.
I will be thinking about possible activities for the 2022 Worldwise Week pack over the year ahead.
Here's the Worldwise Statement of Purpose
The overarching principle of Worldwise is to engage geography teachers and young people with geography across a range of paradigms to develop a secure understanding of the World. It develops young people’s geographical vocabularies, their geographical imaginations of the World around them at a variety of scales and it stimulates their personal geographies. A key aim is to provide directly to teachers and young people opportunities that stimulate a passion trough their understanding of geographical concepts, constructing meaning, deeper thinking and understanding of interconnectedness, interdependency and processes in a world of change. Worldwise engages young people from EYFS to post 16 across its brand of activities. It has to support the acquisition of geographical vocabulary, stimulate interest in young people in a discipline not just seen as a school subject and encourage them to challenge their own thinking, perceptions and those of others within and beyond the classroom environment. This demands Worldwise to generate resources ranging from those seen as ‘knowledge- based, portraying a simpler view of the world and geography through knowledge recall particularly through its face to face and online quizzes. We view these as developing what we would term, enabling knowledge. Students have a knowledge framework which enables them to explore concepts and develop ‘thinking geographically’ with a firm base of knowledge about the world. Worldwise challenges teachers and young people to identify and reflect on their personal geographies and geographical imaginations. To recognise different approaches to understanding the concepts and processes that holds geography as a subject together. The Geography Awareness Week resources, allied to the current Presidential theme are a key element of this challenge. The themes selected, modern approaches to learning and the application of modern technologies all encourage up to date thinking and learning in geography. The awareness week resources encourage teachers and young people to further their understanding of geographical concepts, construct meaning, deeper thinking and understanding of interconnectedness, interdependency and processes. The focus on investigation and enquiry secures awareness week materials as supporting best approaches to twenty first century learning in geography and provides teachers with additional, free, up to date materials to support their curriculum. The ‘week’ acts a as lever for many schools to raise the profile of geography both within the school and often, within the wider community. The Worldwise team deliver two additional activities to engage teachers and young people in new approaches to geography and making geography real. The Worldwide Challenge weekend, for schools who have engaged in other WW activities most successfully brings young people and teachers out into the field in some of the most iconic areas of the UK. The joint GA / FSC partnership generates fieldwork activities that stimulate and challenge geographical thinking, in ways often not seen in the classroom or possible in the classroom. Worldwise delivers an annual post-16 competition, focussing on a geographical issue that is ‘live’ at the time. It stimulates older students to engage with a current aspect of geography, to research it beyond the text book and provide a reflective, evidenced based view of the issue from different perspectives. The winners represent the UK at an annual International Geography Olympiad.
The Worldwise Challenge is an annual fieldwork event organised in association with the Field Studies Council. It is hosted at an FSC centre, and Presidents have previously gone along to get involved and award prizes to the winning team.
References
Walford, Rex. “‘But First the Facts Must Be Familiar..." A Review of the Worldwise Quiz.” Geography, vol. 74, no. 3, 1989, pp. 252–254. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40571674. Accessed 15 Nov. 2020.
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