001 - Skills

Aims

To develop an understanding of the key fluvial characteristics of a river.

To have knowledge of how to use arcGIS and Google My Maps to record data and create knowledge of place.

Activity One - Test

You will be given the test below to see what knowledge you remember from the Freshwater unit. If you are struggling it is essential that you review this unit over the summer to be able to write a successful Internal Assessment.

      • You will initially do the test on your own.
      • You will then work in small teams to write perfect answers.
      • For the questions that you got wrong, make a note of it to focus your revision over the summer.

Activity Two - Location

Image One - River L'Asse

Taken By - Richard Allaway

We will be investigating the River L'Asse which is located in the Canton of Vaud. It's source is in the Jura mountains near Abbaye Beaumont and it's mouth is in Nyon. But what type of terrain does it flow through? What is the land use like? You will need to be able to include a map which has 'value' in the first section of your Internal Assessment.


      1. Using Image One, describe the land use that the river flows through.


Now comes the techie 'stuff' to get a better idea of what the area is like. We are going to be using Google My Maps to view each site that we will be stopping at to record data.


2. Open the Google Sheet spreadsheet which is in Activity Three below, that includes the name of the sites, their location and a value (imagine that this value

is one of the fluvial characteristics). Download the file as a csv file to somewhere logical on your laptop.

3. Open Google ‘My Maps’ and then login with your @learning.ecolint.ch details or go to Google Maps > Your

Places > Maps > Create Map.

4. Create a new map with an appropriate title.

5. For the first Untitled Layer click Import and then choose the fieldwork-sites.csv file from wherever you saved it on your laptop.

6. Using your map describe the land use at all ten sites. Try and do this in ten words of less per site. When you annotate your

map you will only have 10 words to use in each annotation box. Any more than ten words and it is included in your word

count!

7. Point 6 can also be done by hand. Print off the basemap from Google My Maps with the sites on and physically draw the land use on by hand and describe

the different sites (briefly). If you have a Mac you could also do this with Skitch or a PC you could use the print screen function.

Activity Three - arcGIS

There is no skill involved in pressing the 'Print' button on Google Maps and therefore it is essential that we look at different ways to record your findings. One way of doing this is by using Geographic Information Systems and we have access to arcGIS.


      1. Open the Google Sheet spreadsheet below that includes the name of the sites, their location and a value (imagine that this value is one of the fluvial characteristics). Download the file as a csv file to somewhere logical on your laptop.
      2. Go to https://ecolint.maps.arcgis.com/home/signin.html - your username is the first section of your @learning.ecolint.ch email address up to the @. Your password is Nations2018! - you will need to change the password when requested to.
      3. Click on ‘Map’ to create a new map.
      4. Drag the csv file from where you have saved it on your laptop and just drop it onto the map.
      5. Investigate changing the drawing style and the base map.
      6. Write down which base maps and drawing styles you like and why. This will help you to record the data you have collected later on.
Data Collection Sites

Activity Four - map.geo.admin.ch

This site holds a whole range of interesting/useful layers of geospatial data - what can you find that could be useful for the production of your IA. It is also great for creating a detailed base map for you to work on once you have printed it out. You could print the whole river so that it fits on one page or try to create an even more detailed geographic location map by dividing the river into the upper, middle and lower courses and printing them on separate pages. map.geo.admin.ch

Useful Resource

Please also visit www.geographyalltheway.com for more advice on how to complete your IA.