Lesson video

Hi there.

Welcome to your new geography unit.

I'm Ms. Roberts.

I'm really excited to take you through this unit 'cause this unit is all about the coast.

The coast is one of my favourite places to be and I'm very happy to be able to tell you all about it.

This unit will investigate what happens where the land meets the sea at the coast.

Our first lesson is all about the coast of the UK, so let's get started.

If you are not sure what a coast is, don't worry because by the end of this lesson you will be able to describe what a coast is and you'll be able to talk about how people's lives are affected by the coast.

You'll also be able to identify the seas and oceans that surround the UK.

Some of you might live near the coast or you may have visited the coast before.

Here in the UK we have many different types of coasts and coasts have lots and lots of different features.

So there may be coasts that are different to coasts you are more familiar with.

Let's start exploring coasts together.

We're going to start by looking at some words that will be really helpful for you during the lesson.

These are our key words for today.

First of all is the word maritime.

When we describe something as maritime, we're talking about something that is to do with human activity taking place out at sea.

So maritime activities happen at sea or out even in the oceans.

Ocean is actually your next key word.

An ocean is a very big area of salt water.

Oceans are bigger than seas.

Oceans are found between the continents of earth.

Finally, we have the word settlement.

Now settlement are places where people live, and work, and go about their everyday activity.

Settlements can be very, very small or very, very large like some of the huge cities around the world.

This lesson is going to have two parts and in the first part of the lesson today we're going to investigate exactly what a coast is.

Okay, so we're gonna begin by having a look at some of the features we could find at the coast, and then later we will be talking about what it means for the UK to be a maritime nation.

Are you ready? Let's get started.

When we talk about the coast, we are referring to places where the land and the sea meet.

I wonder if some of you have been to the coast before.

Do you live near a coast? Whereabout on the coast of the UK have you been? What did you see there? What did you do there? What words come to mind for you when you think about the coast? Why don't you pause the video just for a moment and have a chat with a geography buddy about those questions and share your experiences of visiting the coast.

Okay, let's continue now and think some more about the coast.

Coasts, the areas where the land meets the sea can be made of many different materials.

Not all coasts look the same and they are not made of the same thing.

Coasts can be made of sand, of rock, of mud or gravel, which is very small particles of rock.

Have you ever been to a sandy beach or have you ever been to a pebble beach like this one? We have both of these types of beaches in the UK.

When you think about sand, you probably think of a picture like the one you can see here with yellow sand on a beach.

I bet you don't think of a picture that looks like this, but here, in this picture, we do have some sand.

You see sand is made from rock, from shells, or from corals.

Sand isn't always yellow because it can take the same colour as the rock that it is made from.

This picture shows you part of black sand beach in Iceland.

The sand here is black because the rock that created the sand was black volcanic rock.

Iceland is a place that has lots of volcanoes and many other places that are volcanic around the world also have black sandy beaches like this one.

Not all coastlines have beaches.

Look at these pictures.

Here you can see two different coastlines and neither of these have a beach.

At some coasts, where the land meets the sea, we have rocks or cliffs.

Some coasts, like the one in the picture here, have huge cliffs that tower above the water.

Some coasts might even have a combination of beaches and cliffs in one stretch of coastline.

There are many other physical features, features of the landscape that we find only at the coast, so we're going to have a look at a few more of these coastal features now.

First we are going to look at a headland.

This picture shows a headland.

A headland is a cliff that sticks out into the sea and is surrounded by water on three sides.

This picture shows part of the coast at Lulworth, in Dorset.

Here we can see the beach, but towards the headland the beach disappears and there are just cliffs in front of the sea.

There's the beach and there's the headland.

So the headland is the part that sticks out the most into the sea.

We can also see the next coastal feature that I want to tell you about in this same photograph.

A bay is an inlet of the sea where the land curves inwards.

Look at the beach in the photograph.

Can you see that it is curved? That's a bay.

Many bays have sandy beaches.

I hope you've been listening carefully whilst I was describing those coastal features.

Let's stop for a quick check before we move on.

Here's a photograph that shows another part of a coast.

In this photograph, you can see several of the features that you have just been hearing about.

Can you identify them? Pause the video and label the features that you can see in the photograph.

Ready? Well done.

Okay.

I'm going to show you some of the features now and where I have put my labels.

The photograph here is part of a coastline in a place called Kefalonia, which is in Greece.

Now, did you label the cliff? There are some very big cliffs in this area.

Did you also label the beautiful sandy beach? How about the headlands that we can see there sticking out into the blue waters of the sea? Is that all we can see in this picture or is there another one? There is another one, it's the bay.

We can actually see two bays in this picture.

Well done if you've got all of those features.

We've looked at physical features of coastal landscapes.

I want you now to think about human features that we find at the coast.

This is a photograph of a coastal area called Dawlish which is in Devon, here in the UK.

Look closely at the photograph.

What human features can you see here? Because coastal areas are so attractive, lots of people like to visit them, so we often find very busy communities around the coast, especially where lots of tourists visit.

We find things like hotels, fishing harbours, and restaurants in coastal areas.

So, what we can say is that the physical landscape features that we find along the coast have a direct effect on the human features that we can find at the coast as well.

For example, fishing and trading ports have grown in places such as river mouths and deep-water bays.

That's because the boats that are used for transporting people and for trade need to be able to come close to the shore and a shallow bay would prevent this from happening.

Ports can be used for ships that are transporting cargo, like in this photograph.

Other ports can be used to transport people, people who are travelling on cruise ships, for example, for holidays.

Some fishing harbours have manmade keys or jetties for fishermen where they mow, that means keep their boats and their fishing equipment.

Here, in these photographs, you can see a trading port, a cruise ship port, and a harbour that is used by fishermen.

Many people choose to live in coastal areas because of the opportunities that they provide.

Many of the world's largest settlements have been built on or near the coast.

For example, the huge city of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and the city of Portsmouth here in the UK, which is on the south coast of England.

Do you live in a settlement near the coast? Or can you think of the name of a settlement that's near a coast? The UK has a lot of coastline.

In fact, about 5.

3 million people in England and Wales live in towns that are found along the coast.

Why do you think that so many people choose to live in these places? There are many opportunities for people that choose to live in coastal communities.

Many people are able to earn their living in the coastal environment.

They may work, for example, in fishing or in coastal defence, in shipping or in tourist related activities.

So, large settlements begin to develop in these places.

Let's think about the city of Portsmouth again.

Portsmouth has many fishing ports, it has shipping ports, and it has lots of places for tourists to visit as well.

People who live in Portsmouth have many different kinds of jobs that are related to these activities.

They may carry out fishing to earn a living.

They may be sailors, they could be people who work on the dock side or in the harbour, and people who work in places like cafes and restaurants for the tourists.

There are lots and lots of different ways that people living near the coast can earn a living.

Places that have beautiful sandy beaches are very attractive to tourists.

In some of those places, tourist resorts have developed.

Tourist resorts are places where you can find many large hotels and lots of activities for the tourists like restaurants, swimming pools, museums, entertainment, and lots of things to do.

Some tourist resorts by the coast have built a pier.

This is a photograph of Brighton Pier in the South of England.

A pier is a large platform that is built on pillars and it sticks out or projects into the sea.

On top of the pier, there are usually things like amusement arcades or restaurants, food outlets, benches to sit on and look at the beautiful view of the sea.

Again, piers, and hotels, and all of these places for tourists provide people living in the area with employment.

You may have noticed in both of these pictures that there is a beach.

Tourist resorts tend to develop in areas where there are sandy beaches, and ports tend to develop where there are sheltered bays for boats to come in and more.

As we said earlier, not all coastlines have beaches.

Not all coastlines have bays.

These kinds of coastlines are further away from population centres or settlements, and that's because those areas of coastline are not suitable for ports to develop.

So for that reason, these areas are largely unspoiled because no construction has taken place there, so we can see the natural scenery and landscape that exists in these areas of coastline.

This example in the photograph is a beautiful stretch of coastline in Ireland.

Let's have a quick pause here and check our understanding so far.

Here you can see three photographs, a, b, and c.

Which of these human features would you expect to find at the mouth of a deep-water bay, a, a port for cruise ships, b, a pier, or c, hotels and restaurants? Pause the video while you choose your answer.

Ready? The correct answer here is a.

Remember, in places such as river mouths where the river meets the sea at the coast and deep-water bays, large boats that are used for transporting people, like the cruise ships in the photograph, they can come closer to the shore in those areas, unlike shallow bays or cliffy areas where that simply couldn't happen.

Well done.

I'm going to move on and give you an activity now about everything we've learned so far to do with the coast.

For this activity, you're going to do some research of your own about the coast.

What I would like you to do is a bit of an investigation about what coasts are like.

I would like you to write four inquiry questions about coasts that you would like to investigate.

For example, your questions might be about what are the longest, the highest, or the biggest coastal features in the UK or in other places.

Remember, inquiry questions should always use question words, and when you write them down, they should end in a question mark.

You can use the internet, or non-fiction books, or even podcasts, or videos to help you to answer the questions that you think of.

Pause the video while you complete your investigation.

Good luck.

I think you're going to enjoy researching all about the UK coast.

Ready? I hope you enjoyed your investigation.

I'm going to share with you some of the questions that I investigated now.

The first question I wanted to answer was, what is the longest pier in the UK? Do you remember seeing the photograph of Brighton Pier earlier? Well, Brighton Pier isn't the longest in the UK.

The longest pier in the UK is found in a place called Southend and it is 2,158 metres long.

That's over two kilometres in length.

It's the longest pier in the UK.

The second question I decided to investigate was where can we find the highest cliffs in the UK? Hmm, there are lots of cliffs in the UK The highest cliff is actually called Great Hangman, what an unusual name.

Great Hangman is found in Exmoor in the South of the UK, in the Southwest actually, and it's 318 metres high.

Wow.

The third question I decided to investigate was what is the biggest port in the UK? We have lots of ports because we have so many places by the sea, but which port is the biggest? The biggest port in the UK is called Felixstowe.

It's Britain's biggest and busiest container port.

And finally my last question to investigate was where is the longest beach in the UK? The longest beach in the UK is in the South of England in Dorset, and it's called Chesil Beach.

This part of the coast in Dorset is called the Jurassic Coast.

It's one of the most beautiful places to visit The Jurassic Coast, Chesil Beach is 29 kilometres in length, which makes it the longest beach in the UK.

What other interesting facts did you research about coasts? I hope you enjoyed your investigation, but it's time now to move on to the next part of today's lesson.

Remember, we used the word maritime earlier to talk about activities that happen at sea.

The UK is a maritime nation, so we are going to think some more now about what that actually means.

Here you can see the UK and as you can see, we are completely surrounded by water because we are an island.

The UK is a maritime nation.

This means that the lives of people living here are connected to the sea.

Look at all the water surrounding every part of the UK.

This is a lot of coastline that we have here.

In fact, there is nowhere in the UK that is any further than about 112 kilometres away from the coast.

This map shows Europe.

You can see the United Kingdom there in the West of Europe.

Maritime nations border the sea.

They rely on the seas and the oceans for trade, for food, for safety, and for transport.

Look at the map.

Can you see any other maritime nations in Europe? Which countries have a coastline? There are many of them, aren't there? For example, you can see the UK as we know and look above the UK, can you see the island of Iceland? These are both maritime nations.

They have a lot of coastline.

Like the UK, Iceland is an island and it's completely surrounded by the sea.

If you look at another country however, like Norway, they are also a maritime nation, but they are not an island.

Norway has a very large or substantial coastline, although some of its borders are connected to other countries, it isn't entirely surrounded by the sea, like the UK or Iceland is.

Countries that don't have any coastline at all that do not border the sea are said to be landlocked.

Look at the map.

Can you identify any landlocked countries in Europe? There are many, aren't there? For example, Switzerland or Austria.

Let's think some more about the UK as a maritime nation now.

The UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean and three seas, the North Sea, the Irish Sea, and the English Channel.

Which of those oceans or seas is closest to where you live? Look at the map to help you.

Have you worked it out? I live closest to the Irish Sea.

Let's pause here briefly and have a quick check for our understanding of the seas and ocean that surround the UK.

Here is a map again of the UK, but this time the water bodies are not labelled.

We can only see A, B, C, and D.

I want you to identify each one.

Pause the video while you complete the activity.

All done? Let's look at the answers together.

Did you correctly identify that A is the Atlantic Ocean? That's the ocean that sits at the top of Northern Ireland and beside Scotland.

Did you identify B as the North Sea? The North Sea is found to the East of the UK.

C is the Irish Sea.

That's the sea between England and Ireland.

And finally D at the bottom, at the South of England, that's the English Channel.

That's the body of water between England and France.

So, the UK is a maritime nation.

What are the advantages of this for the people of the UK? There are actually a lot of advantages to being a maritime nation.

For example, tourism that we have already talked about.

Visitors to coastal areas spend lots of money in hotels, and restaurants, and on entertainment, so this helps people to earn a living.

Being a maritime nation is good when we think about food, because fishing provides us with a lot of fresh food.

We can also do a lot of trading because of the ports that we have also discussed, and coasts are a natural defence because they help protect countries from invasion by land.

As well as advantages there are some disadvantages of being a maritime nation.

For example, it can be isolated as an island.

Maritime nations like the UK might not have as closer relationship with neighbouring countries as they don't share any land borders with anyone.

Instead, maritime nations like the UK, which is an island, needs to rely on transport links for trade and travel into other countries.

We rely much more on travelling by sea or even by air.

This means that it's also more difficult, harder, and usually more expensive to travel or to trade, to and from other countries.

Let's have a quick check for our understanding about those advantages and disadvantages.

Multiple choice question for you here.

I would like you to identify which of these is an advantage to being a maritime nation.

Pause the video while you choose your answer and be careful because there could be more than one correct option.

Ready? Did you correctly spot that both a and c are the advantages of being a maritime nation? B and d are actually disadvantages.

Well done.

It's time for an activity now to round off our first exciting lesson about coasts.

You can see three character cards.

These describe three different people who each live in a coastal community.

Choose one of them and read all about who they are and what they do.

Use that information to help you to answer questions on a hot seat.

The questions are, what are the advantages for you living by the coast and what are any disadvantages to living where you do on the coast? Pause the video now and work with a geography buddy to complete the activity.

All done? Great.

I'd like to share some of my responses to the hot seat questions with you now.

I decided to be the diving instructor, Wayne.

So the advantages of living by the coast for Wayne, he said, "I love diving and being near to the coast.

It means I can earn a living doing something that I enjoy and it's great teaching people how to dive and being able to get out in the sea and experience underwater life." What about the disadvantages of living by the coast for Wayne? Well, there aren't as many visitors in winter, so this means that his work is quite seasonal.

There is also an issue with pollution and water quality and sometimes that can stop dives.

Well done.

We've now reached the end of this first lesson all about coasts, and I really hope you've enjoyed this.

Here's a summary of what we know now about coasts.

We know that a coast is a strip of land that can be made of rock, or sand, or mud, or gravel, and the coast is the place where the land and the sea meet.

The UK is an island surrounded completely by water.

It's surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean and three seas, the North Sea, the Irish Sea, and the English Channel.

We've talked about how many large settlements all around the world are on or near the coast.

We've also talked about how the UK is a maritime nation and that means that the lives of people living in the UK are directly connected to the sea.

Thanks for working so hard and listening well today.

I'll see you next time.

Bye for now.