Product reviews for Making Every Geography Lesson Count

This book is a pedagogical resource aimed at Geography teachers of students aged 11-18 years. It is written by a geography teacher for geography teachers, in a series of subject-specific books based on the original Making every lesson count by Shaun Allison and Andy Tharby. It is written for the General Certificate of Secondary Education curriculum in the United Kingdom but it is easy to realise the similarities with the Australian Curriculum, and the principles of teaching, according to this book, are applicable anyway. In fact, it is even a little inspiring to read due to the strength and depth of the Geography taught in the UK.

Mark Enser aims to equip teachers to ensure that each lesson -˜leads to students learning more, understanding the world better and developing their geographical skills' (p. 127). The book is organised into chapters according to six simple pedagogical principles - challenge, explanation, modelling, practice, feedback and questioning. Each chapter contains key strategies and techniques associated with implementing these principles; teacher/student case studies, examples, and everyday analogies demonstrate how the principles can shape classroom teaching and learning.

The appeal of the book is that it is very much bite-sized (small). Also, the -˜geographer's voice' of the author is strong and will resonate with many passionate geography teachers. Whilst some of the principles, such as modelling, are not particularly new, it is certainly appealing to read such short, sharp explanations with tangible examples. It is easy to make the connections between pedagogical theory and real-life practice of teaching geographical content, concepts and skills.

This book very much emphasises the expert role of the teacher as curriculum planner and its deliverer. This places the sequencing of the curriculum from start to end at the forefront and ensures that students have opportunity to achieve excellence and learn geographical ways of thinking. It is interesting to read about Mark's perspectives on how to continue to develop expertise in a teaching team. At times perhaps, there were too many steps or strategies but ultimately there is no shortage of things to implement straight away. It is surprising that there is not much mention of fieldwork given its essential place in the discipline of Geography.

This book has a broad audience. To an experienced teacher and a geography specialist, this book is both affirming and inspiring. For some, it might encourage reconsidering what high quality teaching in Geography should and could look like. It would make an excellent read for pre-service and graduate teachers by providing guidance in those early years spent trying to build connections between university learning and theory and the little practical experience offered before stepping into a classroom as a graduate teacher. The case studies and very specific geography examples are powerful and could perhaps lend much needed insight and, hopefully inspiration, to non-geography-specialist teachers.