How settlements grow and change
Cities do not sprawl randomly. Land value, transport and planning decisions leave a readable pattern.
Part of your national curriculum
- Place knowledge: Understand geographical similarities, differences and links between places through the study of human and physical geography of a region in Africa and a region in Asia
- Human and physical geography: Understand population and urbanisation, including international development and the causes and effects of migration
Lesson overview
What you'll learn in this lesson
Describe how settlements grow and change
Key learning points
- • Urban zones
- • Change over time
This lesson at a glance
- 25 minutes
- 9 parts to scroll through
- 3 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 9
Watch first
How settlements grow and change
An English teaching video on this topic from CrashCourse. Watch it, then scroll down for the lesson.
In a nutshell
Describe how settlements grow and change
Explore the idea
Part 2 of 9
Learn
Urban zones
A central business district of high-value land, older inner-city terraces, interwar suburbs, then modern estates and out-of-town retail.
Explore the idea
Part 3 of 9
Learn
Change over time
Deindustrialisation empties old sites; regeneration converts them. Gentrification raises values and can displace existing residents.
Quick check
Part 4 of 9
Quick check
Land values are usually highest…
Quick check
Part 5 of 9
Quick check
Gentrification often causes…
Quick check
Part 6 of 9
Quick check
Out-of-town retail parks grew because of…
Challenge round
Part 7 of 9
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 8 of 9
Marked quiz
End of lesson quiz: How settlements grow and change
3 questions, marked with the reasoning shown. No timer.
1. Land values are usually highest…
2. Gentrification often causes…
3. Out-of-town retail parks grew because of…
Lesson round-up
Part 9 of 9
Lesson round-up
Ready when you are
Quiz score
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Games
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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 LunaDo 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.
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
WritingWrite the place, the facts and the figures from this lesson so you can revise them later.
Half a page
Explain answer
WritingAnswer in full sentences, giving causes and effects. Use one figure or place name as evidence.
8–10 sentences
Map or sketch
DiagramDraw the map, cross-section or field sketch with a key, title and labels, then photograph it.
1 map with a key
Data work
Working outPlot 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 9 · Watch & discover
How this is going
- Not looked at yet
Understand geographical similarities, differences and links between places through the study of human and physical geography of a region in Africa and a region in Asia
- Not looked at yet
Understand population and urbanisation, including international development and the causes and effects of migration