Exploring the Concepts and Content in IGCSE and IBDP Geography
This video serves as a great crossover between units like urban environments and oceans/coastal margins in the IBDP syllabus. It’s something you should look out for when you do your post-Covid city trips! An interesting video that concerns many of the concepts of space, place, power, spatial interactions, and more. Credit to Half as Interesting Youtube channel for providing this video.
Why the East Ends of (Most) Cities are Poorer – Half as Interesting
The article below is an interesting read for anyone interested in both rural and urban environments. Counter-urbanisation, urbanisation, tourism, cultural identity, and architectural design are all interesting themes at play in the plans of building Europe’s tallest sky scraper in Brande, a town of just over 7000 people. Credit to the Guardian for the article, no author named. The photograph below provided by Bestseller and found in the article is of the planned skyscraper.
The following two minute video posted by China Spotlight on youtube demonstrates the negative effects of tourism when not managed properly. Additionally, it illustrates the dangers of social media and more specifically geo-tagging and TikTok bringing awareness to intriguing natural sites. A sea of beautiful pink ‘Hairawn Muhly Grass’ is destroyed by tourists looking for that perfect photo opportunity.
This article written by Peter Dockrill for Science alert examines the potentially devestating realities of Arctic ice disappearing. It is based on the modeling research by professor Dirk Notz of University of Hamburg and his team. A quick article definitely worth a perusal for those studying or interested in the effects of the enhanced greenhouse effect and climate change.
In these times where angst prevails, I figured it was time to pull up a classic video, one that mentions some harsh realities, but more importantly, is flooded with optimism. The late Hans Rosling is a legend among the geographic community for his positive-yet-realistic outlook, unyielding enthusiasm, and desire to educate. He is without a doubt a heavy influence on me as a teacher of geography.
In these times when many of us are staying at home, it is important to remember that history shows us we will pull through COVID-19 outbreak. Take a look to check out the astounding ‘progress’ humanity has made in the last 200 years. We’re not where we need to be, inequality still abounds both globally and nationally, but we are indeed moving forward as a species in many ways.
I wish everyone safety and health and a pinch of sanity during these strange times!
While browsing around trying to find reliable and interesting websites pertaining to the Coronavirus that is currently all anyone can talk about, I came across this nifty website. I do not know if it will be updated as time goes along, but it could be an interesting discussions-starter in Food and Health, and Global Interactions units.
https://towardsdatascience.com/coronavirus-data-visualizations-using-plotly-cfbdb8fcfc3d
This 30 minute rundown on the nature of the ‘fast fashion’ industry should be watched by anyone who has interest or passion about shopping, fashion, human geography, human rights, and climate change (and a lot more, of course!). It has many links with the Global Interactions section of the IBDP syllabus, as well as the Resource Consumption section. Take the time to learn the realities of stores like H&M, Zara, and Forever 21, become a more knowledgable and critical consumer, all the while learning about the industry in a humorous way.
https://youtu.be/xGF3ObOBbac
Some explicit language.
The link below is to an excellent resource with regards to many items in the IBDP Geography syllabus. It shows the progression of the most visited countries in the world from 1995 to 2018, using World Bank Data. It has many links to tourism, migration, globalisation, population growth, and more. Thanks user ‘Datalover’ for posting!
You probably have either heard of and/or used these sites previously, but if there’s at least one person out there who hasn’t, then posting them was worth it. These websites have a variety of quizzes that are geographical in nature. Be careful, sometimes they can be dated in terms of information, or it isn’t clear where the data they used is from (ie urban population quizzes). But in general they are fantastic item to close out a lesson that ended too early, to help memorise capitals, flags, or countries, and add a bit of a competitive edge into the geography classroom.
https://www.sporcle.com/games/category/geography
https://www.jetpunk.com/tags/geography
UCL’s Oliver O’Brien has created an easy to use, informative and interesting map of the tube stops in London, correlating them with the (second) languages spoken by residents in that area. This very informative resource can be helpful in discussions about urban planning, ethnic patterns, and socioeconomic distributions in cities.
Click this link for direct access to the map: https://tubecreature.com/#/tongues/current/same/*/*/FFTFTF/13/-0.1000/51.5200/
Click the link to the article below with some image stills, explanation, and access to the map: https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/oct/30/-sp-londons-tube-languages-visualised
