Lesson video

Hello geographers, it's Mr. Robertson here.

And I am delighted to be continuing this unit of work in Europe.

What is it like to live in northern Italy.

Today's lesson builds on our previous lesson where we examined where northern Italy was located and how we might get there from the UK.

Today's lesson, we are going to be looking at geographical features in northern Italy.

I can't wait to get started.

So have we got on our geography caps? Are we ready with our explorer rucksacks? Let's get ready to explore northern Italy.

By the end of today's lesson, you will be able to use maps to identify key physical and human geographical features of northern Italy.

We have four keywords in our lesson today.

I'm going to say the keyword first and then you're going to repeat them back to me.

So let's go.

Our first word is, scale.

Super.

Our second word is, key.

Absolutely fantastic.

Our third words are, physical features.

Brilliant.

And finally, human features.

Oh, very well done geographers.

But what do those words mean? So a scale on a map shows what size the area that is represented in the map really is.

The key on a map explains what the different symbols or colours used on the map mean.

A physical feature is natural and has not been formed or made by humans.

A human feature is something that humans have made or built.

We're going to be using all of these keywords today as we explore the geographical features of northern Italy.

So in our lesson today about geographical features of northern Italy, we have two parts.

The first part of our lesson focuses on physical features of northern Italy.

And the second part of our lesson focuses on human features of northern Italy.

Are we ready to go? Let's go.

Now, northern Italy is a really beautiful place.

It's an incredibly diverse region and it has a range of physical and human features.

I wonder what features you think you will find in northern Italy.

These photographs might give you some clues.

Why don't you pause the video, talk to your geography buddy and see using these photographs as clues, what kind of features might you find in northern Italy? Pause the video, off you go.

What a fantastic range of geographical words I can hear you talking about.

Yes, I can hear some people saying, "Oh, I wonder if there's gonna be some mountains in northern Italy." Some and other people are saying, "I'm thinking there might be some rivers in northern Italy." Other people are saying, "Looking at that photograph of a cathedral, maybe there's gonna be some amazing towns and cities." And other people say, "Oh, I wonder if there are coastlines in northern Italy, maybe some villages." Yes, what some amazing things you're thinking of there.

Let's find out more.

On your screen, you can see two maps.

On the left is a map of part of Europe and the whole of Italy.

And on the right you have a digital map focusing on the northern Italy region.

There are three words here, you can see.

We've got different functions that we might find on a digital mapping tool.

We have zoom, key and scale.

I wonder what you might use these for.

Pause the video, talk to your geography buddy.

See what you can come up with.

Oh wow, lots of great ideas.

Yes, the zoom is really helpful.

If we zoom out on a map, we might see the whole of Europe, but if we zoom in, we can see lots of detail to see what features we can find.

The key is gonna help us find what different things might mean.

So a key is a great way of showing features such as mountains or lakes.

And a scale allows us to look at distances so we can see how far away things are from each other.

Brilliant, if you came up with some of those ideas yourself.

So let's look at this digital map zoomed in on northern Italy.

The first thing we want to say is that there are three major mountain ranges in northern Italy.

There are the Alps, you can see the label to that region there where we find the Alps.

Secondly, the Dolomites, another mountain range just to the east of the Alps.

And finally, the Apennines to the southern end of northern Italy.

The Alps are the largest and highest mountain range in Europe.

I wonder if you can locate these mountain ranges on a map.

You might want to pause the video here, turn to your atlas and see if you can find them.

Here is a photograph and this photograph shows Mont Blanc.

Now, Mont Blanc is the highest mountain in the Alps and it's located on the border between France and northern Italy.

It has an altitude of approximately 4,806 metres, so that's a really, really high mountain.

Look carefully at the photograph.

I wonder what time of year you think that photograph might be taken.

You might think because there's snow that it's taken in winter.

But look carefully, can you see there are flowers in the foreground.

So that suggests to me that this photograph is probably taken in spring, but because the Alps are so high, the very highest mountains are going to have snow for a lot of the year.

So they're really high mountains.

Let's check what we've learned so far.

Which of these mountain ranges is not found in northern Italy? A, Alps, B, Andes, C, Apennines or D, Dolomites? Pause the video.

Have a think.

Fantastic thinking geographers, which of these is not found in northern Italy? B, the Andes.

Because the Andes is, yes, it's in southern America, isn't it? A continent of South America.

Well done, if you got that right.

As well as mountains, northern Italy is home to many lakes.

You can see a photograph there, can't you? Doesn't that lake look absolutely fabulous? Look at the blue of that lake and the blue of the sky.

I don't know about you, but I wanna dive in that lake right now because I love swimming outdoors.

That photograph is of Lake Garda and it's the largest lake in Italy.

If you look at the map on the left, you can see it's near the town of Verona in northern Italy.

Northern Italy is well known for its lakes and there are other well known lakes such as, Lake Maggiore and Lake Como.

Look at that beautiful photograph there.

I can see a fantastic river.

I think it might be autumn because some of the autumnal colour on the trees and I can see a beautiful bridge in the corner and I can see people in a kayak and fishing.

Now of course, there are many rivers and streams in northern Italy.

The River Po is the longest river in Italy and it flows from its source in the outs in the west to the Adriatic Sea in east.

So it reverses almost the whole of northern Italy.

And you can see that photograph is of the River Po.

Northern Italy is bordered by the Ligurian Sea to the west and the Adriatic Sea to the east.

Cinque Terre is a coastal area in northwest Italy and it's a very popular tourist destination.

I wonder why it's such an important tourist destination.

Maybe that photograph would give you a clue.

When I'm looking at that, I'm thinking what an incredible village balanced so precariously on those amazing cliffs.

And I would absolutely love to go and walk round those narrow streets, look at some of those fantastic buildings and also see if I can get down to the sea.

I can understand why someone might want to visit there.

Can you? So let's just check our understanding again.

What is the name of the longest river in Italy? Is it A, the Danube, B, Po, C, Seine, or D, Thames? Pause the video, have a think.

Oh, well done geographers.

I can see you're ticking away there using your geographical understanding.

Yes, it's the River Po.

The Danube flows through Eastern Europe.

The Seine is found in France.

And of course, the Thames is in the UK.

So it's the River Po.

Well done if you've got that right.

Okay, so this is our first practise task.

For this, you can use either an atlas or a digital map.

I'd like you to do some locating.

We're going to locate some physical features in northern Italy.

You're going to mark the locations on your blank map of this region and you're going to create a key to explain your symbols.

I'd like you to mark on the Alps, the Apennines and the Dolomites.

Remember those are all mountains.

I'd also like you to mark on the River Po.

I'd like you to mark on Lake Garda and also, the Ligurian Sea and the Adriatic Sea.

Remember geographers, we don't just write all those words on the map because that would make it very confusing.

We're going to create a key.

So have a think, symbols would be most useful to mark mountains.

How could you show a river on your map? How could you show a lake? And how could you show the seas? Work together, create a key and mark these as accurately as you can.

Off you go, geographers.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how well you do this.

Wow, some amazing locating work there geographers.

Here is my example of a labelled map.

I decided to use a triangle to show the features of a mountain.

I decided to mark a river using a blue line, and I decided to make the lake with a blue shape.

You can see there that I've labelled the mountains, the Alps in the northwest, the Dolomites in the Northeast and the Apennines in the southern end of northern Italy.

I've marked Lake Garda in the middle of northern Italy.

And I've marked on the River Po.

And I've also labelled the Ligurian Sea on the west.

And the Adriatic Sea on the east.

Well done geographers if you managed to do that clearly and accurately using a key.

So the second part of our lesson is going to be all about human features of northern Italy.

Let's go.

Again, northern Italy has a wide range of human features.

The settlements in northern Italy range from tiny hamlets and villages.

And on the left there you can see an image of a village in northern Italy.

Doesn't it look beautiful, situated nestling in the hills with forests and really beautiful architecture.

We also have enormous cities.

And on the right there, you can see a fabulous cathedral.

And that is the cathedral in the largest city in northern Italy, which is Milan.

So we have a real range of settlements in northern Italy.

The cities in northern Italy include Milan, Turin, Genoa, and Venice.

Now, Milan is the city with the largest population and you can see the label showing you where the city of Milan is.

And again, that photograph of the beautiful cathedral in the city centre.

In northern Italy, we have roads and railways which connect many different places.

So in the map on your left, you can see some images of roads and railways that connect the cities and settlements of northern Italy.

And there are also many airports because northern Italy is a really beautiful place and many, many tourists from around the world will come to visit.

You might be able to spot the fact that Milan has the Malpensa Airport and the Linate Airport and the Bergamo Airport.

So it's actually got three airports showing you what an important city it is, but there are also many other airports found throughout northern Italy.

Let's just check what we've learned so far.

What is the name of the largest city in northern Italy? Is it, A, Milan, B, Rome, C, Turin, or D, Venice? Come on, geographers, thinking caps on.

Pause the video, let's have a think Well done geographers.

Yes, it's A, Milan, isn't it? Turin and Venice are found in northern Italy, but they're not the largest cities.

And of course, Rome is the capital of Italy and it's not even found in northern Italy.

Well done if you got that right.

Looking at that map, we could see the River Po, which we learned about in the physical feature section.

The valley the River Po flows through is really important for industry and agriculture.

The energy of the river's water is turned into hydroelectricity.

That's a brilliant form of electricity 'cause it's renewable.

As the river flows through, we can harness its power and generate electricity.

So that's really important for the industry in northern Italy.

The valley has fertile land on each side of the river, and this is used for grazing animals and growing crops such as tomatoes and wheat.

And of course, that is really important in the amazing food you find in northern Italy.

Wheat could be turned into pasta and beautiful bread and tomatoes is really important for those tomato sauces we might have on pizzas.

I'm actually feeling hungry just thinking about that.

Many products are made in northern Italy as well, including cars and clothes.

Think of some amazing famous northern Italian car companies like Ferrari or Alpha Romeo.

We've also said that tourism is a really important industry as well.

Look at that photograph, that is one of the most beautiful cities on earth.

The city of Venice, famous for its canals and gondolas.

Venice is found in northeastern Italy and it's a very popular tourist destination.

I've always wanted to go there, I have to say.

Let's just check what we've learned so far.

Which of these crops are widely grown in northern Italy? I want you to select two answers this time.

Is it A, bananas, B, cocoa, C, tomatoes, D, wheat? Thinking caps on geographers, which two of those are correct? Of course, geographers, it's C, tomatoes and D, wheat, isn't it? Bananas and cocoa are not grown in Italy at all.

Hey, let's do our second practise task.

This time we're going to be focusing on human features.

Again, you can use either an atlas or a digital map to help you with this.

I want you to locate these cities in northern Italy and I want you to mark their locations on your blank map of this region.

So I want you to label and locate Milan, Genoa, Turin, and Venice.

Off you go geographers, can you locate those really accurately? Ah, fantastic.

Here's my example.

We've got Genoa near the coast on the west, Turin near the River Po, Milan and Venice in the east.

Well done if you managed to locate those and label them really accurately.

Hopefully, you'll really begin to build up an understanding of this region now, learning a little bit about what its physical features are like and its human features, amazing geographical work.

This fact we've brought all of these features together and this might be how you've presented it.

Here you can see we've got the physical features such as the Apennines and the Alps and the Dolomites, and also, the river and Lake Garda alongside the cities of Milan, Venice, Genoa and Turin.

Putting all this together enables us to see some patterns and we can see how the physical and human features relate together, which is of course, what we're trying to do as geographers to really understand what a place is like.

Amazing geography work and amazing locational work as well.

So we've learned a lot today, haven't we, about geographical features in northern Italy? We've learned that northern Italy has a diverse range of physical and human features.

We've also learned that digital mapping tools can be used to investigate the features of northern Italy.

We've also learned that using maps of different scales helps us to look at different detail on maps.

And finally, we've learned that symbols are used to show information on a map and a key helps you understand them.

Absolutely brilliant work today, geographers.

And I'm looking forward to our next lesson where we're going to be continuing learning about northern Italy.

Take care and see you soon.