Good Learning Co.
SavannahYear 8
← Geography
GeographyBiomes and climate32 min★★★ difficulty

Managing rainforest change in the Amazon

The Amazon supplies food, timber, minerals and electricity, but each use changes a globally important ecosystem. Geography helps weigh those competing claims.

Part of your national curriculum
  • Human and physical geography: Understand the key processes in biology relating to biomes, vegetation belts and ecosystems
  • Human and physical geography: Understand the use of natural resources, including energy, food, minerals and water
  • Human and physical geography: Understand how human and physical processes interact to influence, and be influenced by, climate change

Lesson overview

What you'll learn in this lesson

Understand the use of natural resources, including energy, food, minerals and water

Key learning points

  • • Why forest is cleared
  • • Local and global consequences
  • • Strategies
  • • Making a geographical judgement

This lesson at a glance

  • 32 minutes
  • 15 parts to scroll through
  • 3 quick checks
  • Marked quiz at the end
  • Gentle pace: short sittings with pauses

Words to know

naturalresourcesenergymineralsforest

Scroll down — the lesson carries on below

Part 1 of 15 · Discover7%
1

Watch & discover

Part 1 of 15

Watch first

Managing rainforest change in the Amazon

An English teaching video on this topic from Learn Bright. Watch it, then scroll down for the lesson.

In a nutshell

Understand the use of natural resources, including energy, food, minerals and water

2

Learning cycle

Part 2 of 15

Learning cycle 1 of 2

Part 1 · Why forest is cleared

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

3

Explore the idea

Part 3 of 15

Learn

Why forest is cleared

Cattle ranching, commercial crops such as soya, logging, mining and road building all bring income and jobs. Roads also open previously remote forest to settlement, so their indirect effect can spread far beyond the strip initially cleared.

4

Explore the idea

Part 4 of 15

Learn

Local and global consequences

Deforestation destroys habitats, interrupts water cycling and exposes soil to erosion. Burning and decay release stored carbon, while fewer trees remove less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Indigenous communities may also lose land, livelihoods and culturally important places.

5

Quick check

Part 5 of 15

Quick check

Why can a new road cause forest loss beyond its own route?

6

Quick check

Part 6 of 15

Quick check

Which approach grows crops while retaining a mixture of trees?

7

Reset break

Part 7 of 15

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
8

Learning cycle

Part 8 of 15

Learning cycle 2 of 2

Part 2 · Strategies

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

9

Explore the idea

Part 9 of 15

Learn

Strategies

Protected areas, recognition of Indigenous land rights, selective logging, replanting and satellite enforcement can reduce damage. Agroforestry grows crops among trees, keeping more canopy and biodiversity than a single-crop plantation.

10

Explore the idea

Part 10 of 15

Learn

Making a geographical judgement

No strategy should be judged by one statistic. A strong evaluation considers environmental protection, local income, enforcement, timescale and who carries the costs. A policy that works on paper may fail if illegal clearing is more profitable than compliance.

11

Quick check

Part 11 of 15

Quick check

Which is the strongest evaluation of a rainforest strategy?

12

Challenge round

Part 12 of 15

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

13

Challenge round

Part 13 of 15

Game · Fill the gaps

Finish the sentences

Choose the word that belongs in each gap.

Roads also open previously remote ____ to settlement, so their indirect effect can spread far beyond the strip initially cleared.

14

Mastery quiz

Part 14 of 15

Marked quiz

End of lesson quiz: Managing rainforest change in the Amazon

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

  1. 1. Why can a new road cause forest loss beyond its own route?

  2. 2. Which approach grows crops while retaining a mixture of trees?

  3. 3. Which is the strongest evaluation of a rainforest strategy?

15

Lesson round-up

Part 15 of 15

Lesson round-up

Ready when you are

Quiz score

Not sat

Games

Not played

Points this lesson

0

Best run

0 in a row

Luna: 0 out of 3 on the practice checks. Only if you feel up to it — one more?

Ask Luna

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

  1. List two physical and two human causes of the 2015 flood.
  2. Explain how planting woodland upstream lowers the river's peak level.
  3. 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

Saved as you type.

Part 1 of 15 · Watch & discover

How this is going

  • Not looked at yet

    Understand the key processes in biology relating to biomes, vegetation belts and ecosystems

  • Not looked at yet

    Understand the use of natural resources, including energy, food, minerals and water

  • Not looked at yet

    Understand how human and physical processes interact to influence, and be influenced by, climate change

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