Earth Environments: Land and Water

Curriculum guideline

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Course
GEOG 1120
Discontinued
No
Course code
GEOG 1120
Descriptive
Earth Environments: Land and Water
Department
Geography and the Environment
Faculty
Humanities & Social Sciences
Credits
4.00
Start date
End term
Not Specified
PLAR
No
Semester length
15
Max class size
28
Contact hours
Lecture: 2 hrs. per week / semester Lab, Field work: 3 hrs. per week / semester
Method(s) of instruction
Lecture
Lab
Hybrid
Field Experience
Learning activities

The course will employ a variety of instructional methods to accomplish its objectives, including some of the following:  lecture, labs, field work, analysis and interpretation of graphs, maps and air photos, multimedia, individual and/or team projects and small group discussions.

Course description
Geography 1120 is an introduction to land and water environments of Earth. This course examines surface materials and landforms, and the processes responsible for shaping them. Topics include rivers, glaciers, coasts, sand dunes, landslides, earthquakes, volcanoes, rocks and minerals. Practical and theoretical concepts will be explored through lectures, labs, and field trips.
Course content
  1. Introduction
    • Physical geography
    • Geographic spatial analysis
    • Scientific method
    • Systems theory and its application to physical geography
  2. Minerals
    • Mineral families
    • Diagnostic properties
    • Mineral identification
  3. Rocks
    • Rock Cycle
    • Igneous rocks, their characteristics and rock-forming environments
    • Sedimentary rocks, their characteristics and rock-forming environments
    • Metamorphic rocks, their characteristics and rock-forming environments
    • Rock identification
  4. Geological Time and Principles
    • Geologic time scale
    • Earth science principles of original horizontality, superposition, cross-cutting relationships and faunal succession
  5. Plate Tectonics and Structural Landforms
    • Development of, and evidence for, plate tectonic theory
    • Plate boundary types, interactions and resulting patterns of tectonic landforms and phenomena
    • Volcanism
    • Crustal deformation processes and resulting landforms
  6. Topographic Maps
    • Projections
    • Map elements: scale, locational coordinate systems, direction indicators, and legends
    • Contour line construction, interpretation and analysis
    • Topographic profile construction and analysis
    • Calculation of vertical exaggeration and gradients
    • Landform measurement, analysis and identification
  7. Weathering and Soils
    • Chemical weathering types, causes, and characteristics
    • Physical weathering types, causes, and characteristics
    • Influences on rates of weathering,
    • Products of weathering
    • Soil characteristics: pedons, profiles, horizons, properties
    • Canadian system of soil classification
  8. Mass Movement
    • Slope processes
    • Influences of slope stability
    • Mass movement characteristics and classification
  9. Fluvial and Groundwater Systems
    • Hydrology
    • Drainage basin morphology
    • Channel morphology
    • Fluvial erosional and depositional processes and landforms
    • Groundwater processes
    • Karst processes and landforms
  10. Glacial and Periglacial Systems
    • Glacial development and classification
    • Glacial mass balance
    • Glacial erosional and depositional processes and landforms
    • Periglacial distribution, processes and landforms
  11. Coastal Systems
    • Components of the coastal environment
    • Coastal sediment transport mechanisms
    • Coastal erosional and depositional processes and landforms
    • Types of coastlines
  12. Aeolian Systems
    • Geographic distribution of aeolian environments
    • Aeolian erosional and depositional processes and landforms

 

Learning outcomes

At the conclusion of the course the successful student will be able to:

 

  1. Describe and use the frameworks of science applicable to first-year physical geography.
  2. Analyze and interpret minerals, rocks, sediment and soils to identify their environment of origin.
  3. Describe and explain the processes that occur within earth’s lithosphere and hydrosphere, as well as their interactions with the atmosphere.
  4. Think critically and examine geomorphological issues in a scientific context at local, regional and global scales.
  5. Communicate effectively using the language, graphical presentation methods and quantitative methods employed in physical geography.

 

Means of assessment

 

Evaluation will include some of the following:

 

Laboratory Assignments

 10-50%

Laboratory Exams

 30-50%

Exams

 25-50%

Field Work

 10-20%

Term Project

 10-25%

 

 

Note:  This course received a standing variance from Education Council in June 2016 to allow up to a 20% lab exam during the final 14 calendar days of the semester.  This is not a final exam; it is an assessment of student learning of lab work performed in the second half of the semester.

Textbook materials

Texts will be updated periodically. A typical example is:

 

  • Christopherson, R.W. Birkeland, G.H., Byrne M-L., and Giles, P. (2016). Geosystems: 4th Canadian edition.   Toronto: Pearson Canada Inc.

 

Which prerequisite

GEOG 2220, EAES 1500, EAES 2320, EAES 2400, EAES 2537, EAES 2851