GeographyGCSE fieldwork, skills and Paper 330 min★★★ difficulty

Paper 3 issue evaluation: reading the resource booklet

The pre-release booklet arrives twelve weeks before the exam. Knowing it well converts the hardest paper into the most predictable one.

Lesson overview

What you'll learn in this lesson

Plan enquiries, select sampling and presentation methods, analyse data and evaluate conclusions.

Key learning points

• What the booklet is for
• Working with the figures
• The decision-making question
• Structuring the nine-mark decision

This lesson at a glance

30 minutes
16 parts to scroll through
4 quick checks
Marked quiz at the end
Gentle pace: short sittings with pauses

Words to know

enquiriessamplingpresentationmethodsconclusions

Scroll down — the lesson carries on below

Part 1 of 16 · Discover6%

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Part 1 of 16

Watch first

Paper 3 issue evaluation: reading the resource booklet

An English teaching video on this topic from erin meryl mcgurk. Watch it, then scroll down for the lesson.

In a nutshell

Plan enquiries, select sampling and presentation methods, analyse data and evaluate conclusions.

Learning cycle

Part 2 of 16

Learning cycle 1 of 2

Part 1 · What the booklet is for

A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.

Explore the idea

Part 3 of 16

Learn

What the booklet is for

It sets out a geographical issue with maps, graphs, text and photographs. You may not take annotations into the exam, but you can learn the content thoroughly, so the reading time in the exam is spent thinking rather than decoding.

Explore the idea

Part 4 of 16

Learn

Working with the figures

Answer using the numbered figures explicitly: 'Figure 3 shows…'. Cross-reference two figures where possible, because linking evidence is what separates the higher levels.

Quick check

Part 5 of 16

Quick check

What may you take into the Paper 3 exam?

Quick check

Part 6 of 16

Quick check

How should you reference evidence?

Reset break

Part 7 of 16

Pause

That's sitting 1 of 2 done

Stretch, get a drink, look out of the window. There is no timer and nothing is counting down — your place is saved, so you can come back in five minutes or tomorrow.

Stop here for now

Learning cycle

Part 8 of 16

Learning cycle 2 of 2

Part 2 · The decision-making question

A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.

Explore the idea

Part 9 of 16

Learn

The decision-making question

You choose one of three options and justify it. There is no correct option; marks come from using evidence from the booklet, considering the alternatives you rejected, and referring to sustainability, cost and the people affected.

Explore the idea

Part 10 of 16

Learn

Structuring the nine-mark decision

State the option, give three evidenced reasons drawn from named figures, explain why you rejected one alternative, and close with a judgement about long-term sustainability. Around a page, written in twelve to fifteen minutes.

Quick check

Part 11 of 16

Quick check

In the decision-making question, is there a correct option?

Quick check

Part 12 of 16

Quick check

Which element is essential to reach the top level?

Explore the idea

Part 13 of 16

Worked example

Model answer: opening of a decision-making response (9 marks, extract)

I would choose Option 2, the restored wetland with a raised embankment protecting the settlement. Figure 3 shows that peak discharge in this catchment has risen by roughly a third over twenty years, so a strategy that stores water upstream addresses the cause rather than only the symptom. Figure 5 shows that the settlement lies almost entirely within the one-in-hundred-year floodplain, meaning some hard protection remains necessary, which Option 2 provides while Option 1 does not. I rejected Option 3 because, although the flood wall offers the highest standard of protection, Figure 6 indicates a cost per household more than double the alternatives and no habitat gain, making it hard to sustain as maintenance costs rise.

Challenge round

Part 14 of 16

Game · Sort it

Which of these are true?

Drag each card into the right column. Tap a card first if dragging is fiddly.

True

Not true

Mastery quiz

Part 15 of 16

Marked quiz

End of lesson quiz: Paper 3 issue evaluation: reading the resource booklet

4 questions, marked with the reasoning shown. No timer.

1. What may you take into the Paper 3 exam?
2. How should you reference evidence?
3. In the decision-making question, is there a correct option?
4. Which element is essential to reach the top level?

Lesson round-up

Part 16 of 16

Lesson round-up

Ready when you are

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Do the work

Your written work for this lesson

This is the part you'd do in your book at school. Pick the pieces below, write here or on paper, and photograph anything you draw or work out.

Case study

Flooding on the River Calder

The town of Harbrook sits where a steep valley opens onto a flat floodplain. In December 2015, 120 mm of rain fell in 36 hours onto ground that was already saturated. The river rose 2.4 m in five hours, and 380 homes and 54 businesses flooded. Two roads and the railway closed for eleven days.

Geographers pointed to physical causes — steep slopes, impermeable rock, heavy rainfall — and human causes: moorland drained upstream, new housing built on the floodplain, and drains designed for smaller storms.

Since then the town has planted 40 hectares of woodland upstream, built leaky dams in small streams, and raised flood walls to 1.8 m. In the storm of 2020 the peak river level was 0.3 m lower and 40 homes flooded, not 380.

Written for Good Learning Co.

Reading questions

List two physical and two human causes of the 2015 flood.
Explain how planting woodland upstream lowers the river's peak level.
Using the figures, judge how successful the scheme has been. Quote data in your answer.

Case study notes
Writing
Write the place, the facts and the figures from this lesson so you can revise them later.
Half a page
Explain answer
Writing
Answer in full sentences, giving causes and effects. Use one figure or place name as evidence.
8–10 sentences
Map or sketch
Diagram
Draw the map, cross-section or field sketch with a key, title and labels, then photograph it.
1 map with a key
Data work
Working out
Plot your figures as a graph on paper and write one sentence about the pattern.
1 graph + 1 sentence

Write your answer, notes or working here

Saved as you type.

Photos of paper work, diagrams or working outHow many minutes did the written work take?

Part 1 of 16 · Watch & discover

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