Re-contextualising Knowledge: The Connection Between Academic Geography, School Geography and Geography Education Research

Abstract

Researching geography education is, in many respects, a recent phenomenon. This chapter takes a historical turn by reflecting on how geography education research has grown over time, contrasting research experiences in geography and education departments in universities to track and compare developments. Geography education research in England expanded as a field post 1945, partly as a result of an ‘eminently practical concern’ to support the pre-service preparation of teachers—which required findings from educational research to assist the training process (Morgan and Firth 2010). By the mid-1960s the Robbins Report (Robbins 1963) had brought teacher education more firmly into the higher education fold, following debate about the possibility of locating initial teacher education (ITE) in universities dating back to the Cross Committee in 1888. University-based teacher education affected the production of research in the field, particularly following the absorption of older-style teacher training colleges into higher education institutes (HEIs) where greater expectations of sustained research performance were prevalent.