Urbanisation and the rise of megacities
In 1950 fewer than one person in three lived in a town or city. Today it is over half, and almost all the growth still to come will happen in Africa and Asia.
Part of your national curriculum
- Human and physical geography: Understand population and urbanisation, including international development and the causes and effects of migration
- Human and physical geography: Understand urbanisation, including the causes and geographical effects, at country and city scale, of urbanisation and megacities
Lesson overview
What you'll learn in this lesson
Explain the causes and global pattern of urbanisation.
Key learning points
- • Defining the terms
- • Rural push factors
- • Urban pull factors
- • Natural increase compounds it
This lesson at a glance
- 25 minutes
- 21 parts to scroll through
- 4 quick checks
- Marked quiz at the end
- Gentle pace: short sittings with pauses
Words to know
Scroll down — the lesson carries on below
Watch & discover
Part 1 of 21
Visual introductionPicture this
Urbanisation and the rise of megacities
In 1950 fewer than one person in three lived in a town or city. Today it is over half, and almost all the growth still to come will happen in Africa and Asia.
In a nutshell
Explain the causes and global pattern of urbanisation.
Learning cycle
Part 2 of 21
Learning cycle 1 of 2
Part 1 · Defining the terms
A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.
Explore the idea
Part 3 of 21
Learn
Defining the terms
Urbanisation is an increase in the proportion of a population living in urban areas. It is not the same as urban growth in raw numbers. A megacity is an urban area with over ten million people; there are now more than thirty, mostly in newly emerging economies. Suburbanisation, counter-urbanisation and urban regeneration describe later stages that mainly affect higher income countries.
Reset break
Part 4 of 21
Pause
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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.
Explore the idea
Part 5 of 21
Learn
Rural push factors
Mechanisation of farming removes jobs. Land is subdivided between children until plots are too small to live on. Drought, flooding, soil erosion and conflict destroy livelihoods. Rural areas often have poorer schools, clinics, electricity and roads. People rarely leave for a single reason: push factors accumulate until staying becomes impossible.
Quick check
Part 6 of 21
Quick check
Part 7 of 21
Reset break
Part 8 of 21
Pause
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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.
Learning cycle
Part 9 of 21
Learning cycle 2 of 2
Part 2 · Urban pull factors
A short piece of teaching, then a check to make sure it has landed.
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Part 10 of 21
Learn
Urban pull factors
Cities offer higher and more reliable wages, formal and informal work, hospitals, secondary schools and universities, electricity, entertainment and the perception of opportunity, spread by relatives who already moved and by social media. Perception matters as much as reality: many migrants arrive to find work harder to get than they expected.
Explore the idea
Part 11 of 21
Learn
Natural increase compounds it
Migrants are mostly young adults of working age, so cities gain a high proportion of people at child-bearing age. Birth rates therefore stay high while urban healthcare cuts death rates, and the city keeps growing even if migration slows. This is why urban populations in many NEEs continue to expand rapidly.
Reset break
Part 12 of 21
Pause
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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.
Quick check
Part 13 of 21
Quick check
Part 14 of 21
Explore the idea
Part 15 of 21
Worked example
Worked answer: explain why urbanisation is fastest in newly emerging economies (6 marks)
Rapid industrialisation concentrates factory and construction jobs in cities, so wages there rise well above rural incomes and attract migrants (2). At the same time agricultural mechanisation and land pressure remove rural work, so families have little reason to stay, and improved roads and mobile phones make moving and hearing about opportunities easier (2). Because those migrants are mostly young adults, natural increase then adds to migration, so the urban population grows from two directions at once (2).
Reset break
Part 16 of 21
Pause
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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.
Challenge round
Part 17 of 21
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
Challenge round
Part 18 of 21
Game · Fill the gaps
Finish the sentences
Choose the word that belongs in each gap.
____ is an increase in the proportion of a population living in urban areas.
Challenge round
Part 19 of 21
Game · Recall cards
A city's population doubles in twenty years. Which pressure is most likely?
Card 1 of 4
Mastery quiz
Part 20 of 21
Marked quiz
End of lesson quiz: Urbanisation and the rise of megacities
4 questions, marked with the reasoning shown. No timer.
1. A city's population doubles in twenty years. Which pressure is most likely?
2. Drought forcing a family to leave is a…
3. Wildebeest migration mainly follows…
4. A pull factor could be…
Lesson round-up
Part 21 of 21
Lesson round-up
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How this is going
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Understand population and urbanisation, including international development and the causes and effects of migration
- Not looked at yet
Understand urbanisation, including the causes and geographical effects, at country and city scale, of urbanisation and megacities