Overview of Lesson		Body of Lesson - Procedure & Assessment
Connection to the Curriculum,Standards and Skills		Activity One and Assessment
Grade Level		Activity Two
Purpose of Lesson		Activity Three and Assessment
Primary Geographic Question		Activity Four and Assessment
Secondary Questions		Activity Five and Assessment
Materials		References

Overview of the Lesson

Topography determines stream flow and stream flow continuously sculpts the land. The anatomy of a stream is greatly dependent on gradient or slope of the land, underlying soils, and relative location whether near the source or mouth. The anatomy of the river greatly impacts the human-environment relationship. Although rivers are quite different from each other, there are some common physical characteristics among streams. The interaction of streams to the Earth's surface is communicated through topographic maps.

Geography Standards

Standard 7: Understand the physical processes that shape the Earth's surface

Standard 15: Understand how physical systems affect human systems

Alabama Course of Study:  Social Studies Content Standards (Grade 7)

Standard 11: Explain patterns in the physical environment within the context of physical processes

Geographic Skills

Organizing Geographic Information: Students will make 3-D models of developing streams and label major components.

Analyzing Geographic Information: Students will infer possible human activity and activity changes based on their understanding of stream development.

Answering Geographic Questions: Students will develop models, answer questions, interpret graphic representations, infer conditions, and practice problem solving.

Grades 7

Students will be able to identify physical characteristics of developing streams and infer changes in the landscape. Connections will be made from landscape models to interpreting topographic maps. Possible human activity also will be inferred from models and maps.

How does terrain affect stream development and what changes occur in the landscape and in streams as they sculpt the Earth's surface on the way to the sea?

What are the major parts of a stream's anatomy and what are the conditions that create them?

Where are desirable sites for selected human activities and how do humans respond to changes in the river?

What affects the behavior of streams?

Where are notable deltas in the world? What are human impacts on their development?

How is the relationship of topography and stream behavior communicated through maps?

• references
• cardboard to support models
• playdoh or modeling clay
• markers
• construction paper
• references on stream flow changes and deltas
• paper
• poster board
• Reflections on Water and Land Handout
• writing or drawing instruments
• physical world map
• push pins
• a variety of laminated topographic maps to provide broader information (USGS and TVA are sources.)
• small colored self sticking dots (optional)
• references on stream development

Activity One

Building a 3-D Model of a Stream

Secondary Questions 1:  What are the major parts of a stream's anatomy and what are the conditions that create them?

Secondary Question 2:  Where are desirable sites for selected human activities and how do humans respond to changes in the river?

Materials:

• references
• cardboard to support models
• playdoh or modeling clay
• markers
• construction paper
 
• In cooperative groups, students may search references to learn about the anatomy and behavior of streams. Research should provide information about these terms: headwaters or source, waterfalls, tributaries, lake, natural levee, meanders, oxbow lake, oxbow scar, floodplain, distributaries, delta, and mouth.
• After students search references, allow cooperative teams or the whole group to discuss the processes involved in the development of each of these terms. For example, Source: created by a stream leaving a lake, water bubbling from a spring, or ice melting from a glacier.
   
 
• Students in cooperative groups will create a river model and identify where they would expect the following to occur. A defense of site selections should be written.
• waterfall
• port city
• small town
• meanders
• greatest amount of sedimentation
• location of industries
• where farmers have their greatest yields
• swiftest flow
• boulder movement
• broadest floodplain
• stream flow changes
• Allow cooperative groups to develop geographic questions concerning at least two other models. These should be submitted in writing to other teams for reflection, evaluation, and changes as needed. Teams will respond to questions and explain any changes made in a whole group setting.
• Problem Solving: Cooperative groups should consider the following scenario. Ideas should then be shared in a whole group setting.
• Over a period of 200 years, the lower part of the river (student developed model) has cut another channel and meandered several miles from the small town site the group identified in Activity #1. The delta has shifted as well. Identify the sites in the list above that may be unchanged and discuss possible problems that people may have encountered at other sites because of this natural phenomenon.

Assessing Student Learning: Activity One

Informal questioning of individuals along with an evaluation of student produced models of the stream's anatomy indicate level s of comprehension of river or stream development on the Earth's landscape. Activities involving inferential skills assess students' ability to apply concepts.

Activity Two

• Secondary Question #3:  What affects the behavior of streams?
• To promote guided discovery learning, cooperative groups will infer influences on stream flow and changes in stream anatomy before conducting a literature survey. Research should then occur to correct and refine thinking. Students will prepare a cause-and-effect chart to communicate information about specific influences on behavior of streams. Concepts will be shared with the whole group before displaying charts.

Activity Three

• In your studies, you learned where meanders of rivers usually occur. How would your group describe floodplains and soils generally associated with meanders?
• Discrepant event: The Colorado River and other western U.S. rivers have cut meandering patterns through hundreds of feet of sandstone. How do you think this happened? Record your inferences then research to check your thinking.

Assessing Student Learning: Activity Three

A rubric may be developed to evaluate charts. Students will independently develop expository paragraphs to communicate the relationships of streamflow and anatomy to such influences as gradient, changes in precipitation, sediment load, velocity, and geology.

Activity Four

• Secondary Question #4:  What are notable deltas in the world?  What are human impacts on their development?
• Predict or infer and record responses as a cooperative group. Then check your answers with appropriate resources.
• Delta Dilemmas
• The Mississippi River is currently building a bird's foot delta, the Nile an arcuate delta, and the Rhone an estuarine delta. Illustrate each of these major delta types. Find photos of these rivers and locate these sites on world maps. What are their sources and direction of flow? Describe the physical landscape through which they flow. What do they have in common? How has human activity affected them? Locate other major deltas on the map along with the locations of large rivers major rivers that have no deltas.
• The Columbia River flows into the Pacific but creates no delta. The same is true for the St. Lawrence River but for different reasons. Brainstorm and record possible reasons why this happens then check your thinking through research. Make notes!

Assessing Student Learning: Activity Four

Students will write a short expository paper that discusses delta types and conditions needed for deposition as well as reasons deltas may not develop at the mouths of major rivers. Students will identify the effects of humans on major deltas. They will suggest changes that may restore deltas and identify the impact that such changes would have on the physical and cultural landscape.

Activity Five

• Secondary Question #5:  How is the relationship of topography and stream behavior communicated through maps?
• Note: Activity # 5 provides an opportunity to apply information learned from previous exercises.
• Directions: Working in cooperative groups and using inferential and map reading skills, students will identify and label sites of river and human activity on the topographic maps. Students may develop a color key for stickers. They will identify several examples of concepts studied that may be on the maps. For example: meanders; meander scars;more desirable sites for agriculture, houses, and industries; tributaries, floodplains, and other observations.
• Cooperative groups will share information found and defend their thinking within the whole group. Maps may be exchanged and the activity repeated to reinforce concepts.

Assessing Student Learning: Activity Five

How thorough were the students in identification of anatomy parts of streams on their map? How well did they communicate their defense of their inferences of human activity?

Christopherson, Robert W. 1997. Geosystems: An Introduction to Physical Geography. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.

Dunn, Margery G. et al. Eds. Exploring Your World: The Adventure of Geography. 1995.The National Geographic Society, Washington, D.C.

Lee, Douglas. Mississippi Delta The Land of the River. 1983. National Geographic Magazine 164: 226-253.

Theroux, Peter. The Imperiled Nile Delta. 1997. National Geographic Magazine 191: 2-35.

Zich, Arthur. China's Three Gorges Dam. 1997. National Geographic Magazine 192:2-33.

NASA