Lesson video

Hello, my name is Ms. Chorekdjian.

I'm so excited to be learning with you today.

I will be guiding you through our geography lesson.

I'm really excited to get started.

We're going to have a great time learning together today.

Let's start our learning.

Welcome to today's lesson from our unit called "Local Area: How Is It Changing?" Together, we'll be continuing our learning about our local area and how it's changing.

Today's lesson is called "Mapping Changes." Our learning outcome is to interpret fieldwork data to find out more about where we live and how it's changing.

Some of this learning is brand new, but I'll be here to help you.

This links back to previous learning you might have done.

Investigating your local area, seeing how it's changed over time, and collecting information about it from fieldwork.

I'm really excited to get started, I hope you are too.

Here are the key words for our lesson today.

Data, graph, interpret, and spatial patterns.

Let's do my turn, your turn to practise saying these key keywords together.

Data, data.

Graph, graph.

Interpret, interpret.

Spatial patterns, spatial patterns.

Good job.

We'll be using these keywords throughout our lesson today.

Let's think in more detail about what these keywords mean.

Here are the definitions of our keywords.

Data is a collection of facts or figures that can be analysed to provide information.

A graph is a diagram or picture that displays data, to interpret is to decide on the meaning of something.

Spatial patterns show how data is different across an area.

These are the learning cycles that we'll be working through together in today's lesson.

First, we'll be identifying spatial patterns from evidence.

Then, we'll be thinking about what people think about change in our area.

And finally, we'll be thinking about what we know about our changing place.

I'm really excited about today's learning, I hope you are too.

Let's get started.

We've now collected lots of evidence about change in our local area.

We've collected evidence of change by looking at historical maps, taking photographs of current changes, completing environmental assessments of an area, and in this lesson, we will try and identify some spatial patterns by presenting this information.

In one of our earlier lessons we completed together, we were measuring settlement change.

Using historical maps, we found out that St.

Albans has grown from a village into a city.

It has grown further in different directions because of natural and manmade factors.

So things that are physical features or human features.

Remember these arrows, they show us the direction in which the growth has taken place.

Roman historical sites prevented growth to the west, and the River Ver acted as a natural barrier.

The centre of St.

Albans is the oldest part of the settlement.

We planned our fieldwork around this area.

We were looking for current changes, and remember that current changes can't be seen on historical maps, because the changes are too new.

They're happening right now, and that's why we went outside, and completed our fieldwork to have a look at them as they were happening.

Let's have a check here.

Which of these would be evidence of people bringing about current change in our local area? A, gardeners, B, a bus stop, C, painters, or D, road sweepers.

Pause the video now and complete this check.

How did you get on? Did you correctly say, A, gardeners, C, painters, and D, road sweepers? Good job, I'll give you a thumbs up.

All of these people are bringing about current change in our local area.

Do you remember that we also conducted an environmental assessment at each location? We recorded the type of change that we saw, and our opinion on them.

So do you remember for location A, I said that I didn't think it was a small change or a dramatic change.

It was about a medium change, and that I felt that it was quite a positive change, and that emoticon there that I circled showed that I liked the area.

So that was my opinion of the change that I saw.

Let's have a look at this environmental assessment that was recorded at location B during my fieldwork around my local area.

You can see that number five has been circled next to dramatic change.

So this tells us that the building work might have been very large scale.

Five has also been ticked next to where it says positive change.

So this tells me that during my fieldwork, I thought that this was a really positive change.

I thought it would have a positive impact on the local area, but my opinion of that change shows quite an unhappy emoticon face.

So I didn't actually like the change that I saw, and that could be for many different reasons.

So let's have a think in more detail about what this evidence shows us from this environmental assessment.

Do these results show that dramatic change can be positive? Pause the video now, and think about this check.

So how did you get on? What did you think? Did these results show us that dramatic change can be positive? Yes, the building work here is huge, and there's been a dramatic change.

This will improve the local area as there will be more housing, and there might even be some more shops as well.

Can changes be positive for the local area, but still not be liked by people? What do you think here? My opinion of the change in the area showed that I'd circled an unhappy face.

Have a think about what this tells us.

Yes, some people might not like this change and that's fine because that's their opinion.

Remember that people's opinions change from person to person and they're not based on any facts.

They're just based on their own thoughts and feelings.

Well done for completing that check, that was quite tricky, but you've done really well.

It's now time for Task A.

Now that we've revised all the evidence and data that we've collected, we need to think about presenting this in a way that we can understand it as geographers.

Your first task is to add photographs that you took on your fieldwork and the emoticons and opinions from your environmental assessment onto a large map of your local area.

Once you've done that, you'll able to see if there are any spatial patterns to the data.

For example, is there more change in one area of your map? Where is the most dramatic change, and which changes were most liked on your opinion survey? Pause the video now and complete Task A.

How did you get on? I've added my photographic evidence and emoticon and opinions of the changes around my local area to my map of St.

Albans.

The main changes were due to building work.

This has had a dramatic impact on the local area.

Some of these changes were liked, but others were disliked, even if they could eventually have a positive impact on the local area.

So you can see there that I've liked the building of that playground.

I felt kind of indifferent a bit okay about the building work happening there.

You can see there for the roadworks that I've put a sad face emoji, this might be due to the disruption that they were causing at the time, so for example, more traffic, temporary lights, and lots of noise pollution.

Well done for completing that task.

Again, that was really tricky, but you worked through it so well.

You can give yourselves a thumbs up.

Now, we're going to think about what people think about change in our area.

In our third lesson, we also created a survey with questions to ask our friends and family.

Can you remember what some of these questions were? We tried to use yes and no questions and scaled score questions to make it easier to analyse the data.

When I created my survey, these were the questions that I asked about St.

Albans.

On a scale of one to five, how much do you think our local area has changed for the better? Remember, I included the scale there.

One, it has definitely changed for the better, and five, I don't think the changes have improved St Albans at all.

The second question that I asked was do you think our local area has enough housing? And that was a yes or no question.

And then the third question that I asked was, are there enough green spaces in our local area? And that was a yes or no question as well.

You might have some different questions from your survey from Lesson 3, but that's okay, because we were using it to find out about what our friends and families think.

We can use the data from the survey to present our findings in a graph.

I'm going to show you how to present the data from my third question, are there enough green spaces in our local area, yes or no? Because there are only two possible answers to this question.

I know that my graph will have two data bars along the X-axis, one for yes, and one for no, and that the Y-axis will have the number of people who answered along the side there.

Remember that your graph needs to have a title, and each axis needs to be labelled so that people know what the data represents.

So my graph title is called graph to Show opinions on If there are enough green spaces in St.

Albans.

My X-axis shows the responses, so either yes or no, and my Y-axis shows the number of people that responded with each of those answers.

When we counted up the responses to this question, there were 41 people who said no, and nine people who answered yes.

We need two bars on our chart, one for yes and one for no.

So you've got to look carefully along the Y-axis, and make sure your bar represents the number of people that said no shows 41, and the number of people that said yes shows nine.

It's now much easier to see the answer to this question.

Let's have a check here.

What do all graphs need? A, colours, B, labelled axes, or C, a title.

Pause the video now, and answer this question.

How did you get on? Did you answer B, labelled axes, or C, a title? Well done, both of those are correct.

All graphs need labelled axes and a title, so you know what information is being presented in your graph, and you know what the answers are representing.

Well done, let's continue with our learning.

It's now time for Task B.

So here's your second task.

Use the worksheet template to show responses to another of your survey questions on a graph.

You can see from my graph that this is not a yes or no survey question.

The X-axis has a scaled score along the bottom, and you can use this with any of your scaled score questions.

Complete Task B and pause the video now.

How did you get on? Here's my example.

I use the question, how much do people think St.

Albans has changed for the better? And I've used that to label my graph with a title.

I've used all of my scaled score data to create five bars, one for each of the scaled score answers.

I remembered to add my title, there it is.

And for the Y-axis, I've labelled it with a number of people.

I've also included a key, which shows me what the numbers for the scale score mean.

So number one means that it's definitely changed for the better, and number five means I don't think the changes have improved St Albans at all.

So straight away there you can see that most people responded with three, which means that they didn't definitely say the changes had made the area better, but they didn't say that the changes didn't improve the area so they were in the middle.

We could also see that more people thought the change was positive, because there's more people that said number one or number two compared to number four or five, which showed that they didn't think the changes had improved St Albans.

Well done for completing that task.

That was quite tricky learning, but again, you've done so well.

It's now time to move on to the final part of our lesson.

For our final part of today's lesson, we are going to summarise what we know now about our changing place.

We're going to look back over all of the learnings that we've done so far, thinking about change to our local area.

We are going to see if we can answer any of our inquiry questions that we created earlier on.

So back to my example of St Albans.

St Albans is a settlement that has been growing and changing for a long time.

We saw this when we measured the change in our settlement size.

Remember we looked at these two historical maps and compared them with a modern map.

The first map we looked at was from 1890.

Then we looked at a map from 1950.

And the modern map was from 2023.

So you could see in those maps that the pink area shaded is getting bigger, and that shows us that St Albans is growing.

The newest parts of the city are in the east and the north where development is continuing and new homes and shops are being built, and there's a picture there of that area.

Although the centre of the city has existed since before 1890, it continues to change.

So you can see that there's some renovation building work happening to this building here.

Let's check our understanding of the main changes that we've observed so far.

I want you to add missing words to these sentences.

St Albans is a settlement that has been, and changing for a long time.

The parts of the city are in the east and the north where development is continuing and new homes and shops are being built.

Although the centre of the city has existed since before 1890, it continues to.

Pause the video now, and complete those sentences.

How did you get on? Did you correctly fill in those missing words? St Albans is a settlement that has been growing and changing for a long time.

The newest parts of the city are in the east and the north where development is continuing and new homes and shops are being built.

And the final sentence can be completed with the word, change.

Although the centre of the city has existed since before 1890, it continues to change.

Well done, you can give yourselves another thumbs up.

It's now time for Task C.

I'd like you to interpret the data that we've collected from our survey and fieldwork to answer these questions.

Is your local area still changing? Do people in our local area think our local area is changing for the better? Which area shows the most dramatic change, which changing area is liked the most? Pause the video now and answer these questions.

How did you get on? I'm sure you used all the data and evidence that you gathered from your surveys and your interviews and your fieldwork to help you answer these questions.

Here's my answer to Task C.

So for question one, is an St Albans still changing? I've written, "Yes, we've seen lots of change on our fieldwork, even in the centre of St Albans." Question two, do people in our local area think St Albans is changing for the better? "15 out of 36 people asked, said they thought it was changing for the better." Which area has the most dramatic change evident? "Area B had the most dramatic change as a whole building was demolished and replaced." And for the final question, which changing area is liked the most? "Area A was liked the best.

It is being renovated, and it looks nice." I'm sure you worked really hard completing that task.

Well done.

You can give yourselves another thumbs up.

We've now come to the end of our lesson.

We finished our inquiry into how our local area is currently changing.

Well done.

We've done some excellent geographical thinking in this lesson.

Let's go through a summary of all of the learning that we've completed together today.

Using a map allows spatial patterns to be spotted more easily.

Facts and opinions can be added as data to a map along with supporting evidence such as photographs.

Data from responses to surveys, and interviews can be interpreted and presented as graphs, charts, or emoticons with or on a map.

You've been fantastic today.

Well done for joining me for today's lesson and for sharing your learning with me.

See you next time for more geography lessons soon, bye.