Program Overview

Introduction to GEOG110 - Exploring Natural Environments

GEOG110 is a foundation unit in geography, environment, and society (GES) that explores the natural environments of our planet and the processes that shape and change them. This unit is designed for students who want to better understand how our planet functions and is suitable for those interested in geography, environment, and society.

Unit Details

• Year: 2024
• Credit points: 10
• Campus offering: Brisbane, Melbourne, Strathfield
• Prerequisites: Nil
• Incompatible: GEOG100 - Changing Planet Earth

Unit Rationale, Description, and Aim

The study of our planet's natural environments and the processes that shape and change them is critical to understanding the fundamental systems that affect our lives. This unit aims to develop students' understanding of the connections between society and the environment and how patterns and changes in landforms, soils, plants, and animals, oceans, and waterways are connected and interdependent at different scales.

Learning Outcomes

To successfully complete this unit, students will be able to:

1. Describe how processes of the atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, and biosphere and their interaction contribute to the evolution of the Earth's surface.
2. Collect, identify, and interpret geographic information from literature, graphs, maps, remotely sensed images, and statistics.
3. Examine the connections between humans and the environment.
4. Develop skills in fieldwork, including teamwork, observation, recording, and evaluation of geographical data.
5. Summarize and communicate geographical ideas and information in written and oral forms.

Content

Topics will include:

• Earth, a brief history: the Big Bang, the Solar System, the sun, the moon, and the seasons
• What is time, and how does it work? Location systems (latitude and longitude), maps, and GPS, time (AM and PM), and time zones
• Earth's building blocks: Plate tectonics, geological processes, rocks, and minerals
• The four spheres: lithosphere, biosphere, atmosphere, and hydrosphere
• An introduction to weather and climate and its impact on landscapes
• The global water cycle and water resource management
• Soils, their formation, and how they support humanity
• Earth's oceans and coastal environments
• The biosphere, biodiversity, and integrated social-ecological systems
• Indigenous environmental knowledge and ways of viewing the natural world

Learning and Teaching Strategy and Rationale

This unit uses face-to-face instruction during class, with lectures conveying new material and offering students the chance to engage and ask questions in person. Tutorials provide opportunities for students to put their knowledge into practice, gain hands-on experience, and learn and practice geographical skills. Fieldwork is an integral aspect of GEOG110, allowing students to explore and observe environments, develop key geographical skills, and learn firsthand about environmental processes and systems.

Assessment Strategy and Rationale

The assessment tasks for this unit are designed to contribute to high-quality student learning by helping students learn (assessment for learning) and measuring explicit evidence of their learning (assessment of learning). Assessments include:

• Skills development tasks: A series of tasks where students collect, identify, and interpret geographical information (25%)
• Research project: Undertaking fieldwork to develop skills in planning, observation, recording, sampling, analysis, and evaluation, and reflecting on the human impact on the environment (35%)
• Examination: A formal semester-end examination where students describe how geographical processes shape the Earth's surface, interpret geographical information, and summarize and communicate geographical ideas (40%)

Representative Texts and References

• Bridgeman, H, Dragovich, D, and Dodson, J. 2008. The Australian Physical Environment. Oxford University Press, South Melbourne.
• Cahir, F., Ian Clark, and Philip Clarke, 2018. Aboriginal Biocultural Knowledge in South-eastern Australia: Perspectives of Early Colonists. CSIRO PUBLISHING.
• Christopherson, R.W. and Birkeland, 2019. Elemental Geosystems (9th edition). Pearson, Upper Saddle River.
• Goudie, A.S. 2018. The Human Impact on the Natural Environment (8th Edition). John Wiley & Sons.
• Hay, I. 2012. Communicating in Geography and the Environmental Sciences (4th edition). Oxford University Press, South Melbourne.
• Hess, D and Tasa, D. 2022. McKnight's Physical Geography: a Landscape Appreciation (13th edition). Pearson Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River.
• Holden, J. 2017. An Introduction to Physical Geography and the Environment (4th edition). Pearson, UK.
• McGrath A, and Jebb, M.A. (eds), 2015. Long history, deep time: deepening histories of place. ANU Press, Canberra
• Mayhew, S. 2015. A Dictionary of Geography (5th edition). Oxford, London.
• Strahler, A.N. 1974. Physical Geography. Wiley, New York