Distinctive landscapes (FMGL1.1)

[0:10]Hi, this is your five minute geography lesson. We're covering theme one, element one, distinctive landscapes. Welcome, take your seats. I'm Mr. S and I'll be your five minute teacher. The UK is made up of different features and land forms that we call landscapes. Many of these are unique to a location, so we'd call them a distinctive landscape. But first up, let's have a look at some of these landscapes and where they're located in the UK. We're going to look at two varieties. We can split our um home up into two in terms of upland areas and lowland areas. If we look at the upland first. So upland areas are high above sea level. And generally, they're the mountainous and hilly areas of the UK. So on our map we can see that's the browns and the yellows on this map. And they're predominantly in the north and the west of the UK. So we've got a huge portion of very tall mountains or mountainous areas in Scotland. We've also got the spine running down the center into the west of England, which is the Pennines, and then you've got the Lake District here as well. And then Wales on the west is predominantly mountainous areas, and then you've got some as well in the west, or the southwest. and some surrounding in the Northern Ireland. So, as a general pattern, our upland areas tend to be north and to the west. In contrast, we've got our lowland areas. So these are the colors in the greens, particularly the lighter greens, which we can see over here on the east coast. So lowland areas are very close to the sea and generally they're quite flat. Uh, and they're the opposite of what we've been talking about in terms of the locations. So they tend to be on the east coast and particularly in the south. So let's have a look at one example of a distinctive landscape. So in this case, we're going to have a look at Snowdonia in Wales, in Northern Wales. Now, we can say that upland and lowland areas are found in quite a few different places around the UK. So that not doesn't necessarily make them distinct, but we can look in a bit more detail and have a look at four different factors that make an area distinct. So let's start off with the geology. Snowdonia, like much of the UK, has been influenced by volcanic activity. Millions of years ago, we were on a plate margin and we did have volcanoes, which is not the case now. So some of the features in Snowdonia, as well as other places in the UK, have been formed because of that. So volcanic eruptions have created some of the rocks, igneous and metamorphic rock in snow uh, in Snowdonia. And then we've also had ice ages and glaciation, which have carved out some of that as well. So what we see in our picture is we've got some flat area, or U-shaped area from the glaciation. But we've also got these pyramid uh pyramid style mountains, which come from uh glaciers as well, sort of the corries and the rets, which are quite unique to glacier areas. Wales also has the highest mountain or sorry, Snowdonia has the highest mountain in Wales at 1,085 meters tall. And then if we have a look at how humans have used that geology, well, because of the volcanic activity in the area, we've had a lot um the production of slate, which has been mined. Because Snowdonia is high up in an upland area, it's not very good for growing crops, but it's brilliant for pastoral farming, raising animals, sheep predominantly. And because it's a distinctive landscape, it draws in a lot of tourists. So the national parks drawing tourists. Snowdonia is also known for its flora and fauna, so it's vegetation and its animals. There are two unique species to Snowdonia. You've got the Snowdonian beetle and the Snowdonian Lily, which you wouldn't find anywhere else in the UK. And even for people's and cultures looking way back in time, we have the Celtic shrines and fortresses, and even today we have the Welsh medium, the Welsh language that is spoken. So, on its own, each one of these factors may not necessarily make it a distinctive landscape. But when you put it all together, it produces Snowdonia as a distinct, unique area that's not like anywhere else in the UK. Well, that wraps it up for the day, but we'll continue your revision by completing the now try it tasks for homework. Class dismissed.