A1. Application: Interrelationships between Settlement and the Environment
Specific Expectations
A1.1
analyse some of the ways in which the physical environment (e.g., climate, landforms, soil type, vegetation, natural resources) has influenced settlement patterns in different countries and/or regions around the world (e.g., how climate, vegetation, and natural resources have influenced settlement patterns in Brazil; how landforms have influenced settlement patterns in Japan; how landforms, climate, and soil types have affected settlement patterns in Egypt)
- Why are there so many high-rise buildings in Hong Kong?
- Which countries or regions in the world are the most sparsely populated? What physical factors account for their low populations?
- What does this land-use map of the United States tell you about which physical environments are most conducive to settlement?
- If you could establish a settlement anywhere in the world, where would it be? What criteria would you use to select the location?
A1.2
analyse how processes related to the physical environment may affect human settlements in the future (e.g., the impact of rising sea levels on coastal cities as polar ice caps melt, of desertification, of earthquakes in increasingly populous regions, of increasingly violent tropical storms as a result of climate change)
- What impact might a serious natural disaster, such as an earthquake, tsunami, or flood, have on an urban centre?
- What impact would rising sea levels have on coastal cities? Which cities would be most severely affected? How many people would this affect?
- What lessons about land reclamation can be learned from the flooding in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina? Where else in the world is reclaimed land vulnerable to physical processes?
A1.3
describe possible features of a sustainable community in the future (e.g., energy-efficient buildings, use of renewable sources of energy, a comprehensive public transportation system, community gardens, roof gardens, green canopy, naturalized parks with native species, programs for waste and water recycling), and analyse some challenges associated with creating such a community (e.g., cost, population growth, increasing urbanization, continued dependence on fossil fuels)
- What types of actions can be taken to make buildings more sustainable?
- In what ways might the global movement of people to cities be a barrier to making both rural and urban settlements more sustainable?
- What factors need to be considered when trying to find a balance between accommodating growing population and practising sustainable land use?