Rivers (KS2)
Rivers are named directly in the KS2 geography curriculum, and they’re one of the clearest ways to show children that landscapes are made by processes still happening now. From source to mouth, here’s what the curriculum expects and where to find lessons and resources to teach it.
What children learn about rivers at KS2
What the national curriculum expects
Rivers appear twice in the KS2 geography curriculum. Under physical geography, pupils should describe and understand key aspects including rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, climate zones, biomes and vegetation belts, and the water cycle. Under locational knowledge, pupils should name and locate key topographical features of the United Kingdom including hills, mountains, coasts and rivers, and understand how some of these have changed over time.
Key knowledge and concepts
Within this topic, children build knowledge across how rivers form, flow and shape the land:
What is a river
How rivers form, and where their water comes from
Source to mouth
The journey a river makes, and how it changes along the way
River features
Meanders, waterfalls, tributaries, floodplains and deltas
Erosion and deposition
How rivers wear away and build up the land
UK rivers
The major rivers of the United Kingdom, and where they run
World rivers
Significant rivers around the world, and the places they shape
Rivers and people
Why settlements grow along rivers, and how we use them
Flooding
Why rivers flood, and what that means for people nearby
Where this topic sits within KS2
The National Curriculum doesn’t set a year group for rivers. It sits within KS2 physical and locational geography, and is often taught alongside mountains and the water cycle, since the three describe the same journey from different angles.
How to access this topic
Rivers don’t sit on their own in the curriculum. The Cornerstones geography curriculum is fully sequenced from EYFS through Year 1 to Year 6, so you can see what comes before, what follows and how the whole picture fits together. We’ve done the thinking, so your planning time goes into teaching, not sequencing.
Full curriculum
Subject curriculum
Quick Teach Individual lessons and resources for supplementing what you already teach.
Ready to bring the wider curriculum to life?
See how the full Cornerstones Geography Curriculum sequences topics like this one across every year group.