Holiday Work

1. Holiday Work I know it is a long way but ….

2. Some of it needs some planning! But first off, the bit that doesn’t • I want you have completed 2 questions for each Unit we have covered • As each exam question takes half an hour • For the exam you will get 2 questions: • 1 on Migration and 1 on Production • This means that you will have done 2 on Production, so you don’t want another of those during the holidays • But you will get one on each of: Water, Hazards, Development and Migration

3. Now I have not made a big thing of this but … • There is a short 2nd paper, which is supposed to cover the ground you would have covered had we done fieldwork – it involves designing fieldwork and reading tables and drawing graphs and coming to conclusions from data they provide you with. • We will spend time after Christmas next year going through the main tools and pitfalls. • However, it is really important that you have had a go at some sort of field work.

4. I know in previous years .. • There has been one piece of coursework set for everyone to do. • That has planning advantages but there are definite problems: • 1. You all live in such widely varied environments that one piece is just not going to possible for all of you • 2. By concentrating on one topic, there are a number of skills that none of you will ever have come across – so we won’t have anything useful to examine and talk about.

5. For this reason • I have a number of ideas up my sleeve and I want you to choose one general area to go into further – I will then negotiate with you individually as to what would be the most useful and most straight forward investigation for you to do. • You will then complete this over the Summer holiday – with me at the end of an email most of the time – when I am not, I will email about my ETR (estimated time of return). • I will then put them all up on the wiki – so you can all see the variety of ideas that you need to be aware of – and we will use them as a basis for discussion

6. I have given you 5 broad areas • And have included some of things that you might do – that does not mean everything in each section but the thoughts are there to give you an idea of the kind of investigations that you might be involved in. • As I say this will be an individual project that will be suited to what you have available.

7. Here are some thoughts: • 1. Investigating rivers e.g. How does the speed of the river change as you go down stream? – What is the hydraulic radius and discharge at one or 2 places? – How does the size and the shape of the bedload change as you go down stream? – there are others! • 2. Microclimate – if you have a big garden with different areas – shaded, sunny, sheltered, windy – collect the data and answer the question, what would be the best place to put a …?

8. Here are some thoughts: • 3. Urban studies: Does your large town/city follow one of the models? – this will involve a bit of walking with a camera along a transect (a line from middle to edge) and some work on Google. • 4.(a) Retail: Do shops supplying comparison goods have a greater range/sphere of influence than shops selling convenience goods? • 4.(b) Another retail type one: Is your town a clone town? [Only do-able if your high street has more than 50 shops] • 5. If you have a nearby tourist attraction/ sea side resort: What do the visitors say? What is the environmental impact of tourism?