Geography subject report · May 2018

May 2018 extended essay reports Page 1 Geography Overall grade boundaries Grade: E D C B A Mark range: 0-6 7-13 14-20 21-26 27-34 The range and suitability of the work submitted The work was generally of a good standard with some great, creative innovative geographical essays; yet more candidates could have scored in the higher bands if their essays had been spatial enough. Some centres submitted essays that were only marginally geographical as students were not able to accurately map their results , and their research questions were not focused enough to be easily deciphered through spatial analysis methods. Successful essays analysed spatial patterns in cities (for example, mapping socio- economic disparities, CBDs and spheres of influence studies), along coastlines (mangrove zonation patterns) or in particular ecosystems (tropical rain forest conservation in contrasting reserves) using maps produced with the data gathered; at the bottom end were the essays solely based on written literary sources (as opposed to data), or based on non-representative sample sizes (including the ones that followed a more IA -type structure based on studies that were too narrow to produce the type of original in- depth research necessary for this component). A number of essays were highly descriptive and therefore preventing better performance against Criterion C, the research questions of many of them were extremely broad in scope (national or even global scale) which then, penalized the work against criteria A and B. A good number of ess ays seemed to f ocus on a broad geogr aphical theme or were based on case studies rather than focusing on a spatially driven argument. Unnecessary marks were lost in overly descriptive essays, essays that did not involve a spatial element, poor quality sources, poor layout and use of graphic materials, l ack of focus on research question and direct response to it and simplistic descriptive reflections.