013 Hazards and Land Use - Reading Hazard Evidence
👩🏫 Teacher’s Guide
Objective
Read a geographic dataset, including its variables, units, and assumptions.
Vocabulary
hazard, exposure, vulnerability
Suggested time
30-40 minutes, with optional practice across the week.
Teaching Notes
- Ask students to identify units and assumptions before calculating. Require a written explanation that separates observations, calculations, and conclusions.
- Introduce the study resource before assigning questions. Students can answer using this lesson without opening the source book.
- Use questions 1-4 for guided practice and the remaining questions for independent practice or discussion. Open responses may use different wording if the evidence supports them.
- Check the activity against its stated constraints and the answer bank. Revisit a missed concept before adding a new one.
🧒 Student Worksheet
Concept and Helping Material
A hazard is a potentially damaging event or process. Risk depends on the hazard together with exposed people and assets and their vulnerability. A map of past flooding is evidence, but it is not a guarantee about every future event. The following invented site data support a planning exercise, not an actual safety assessment. Begin by identifying the variables, units, and stated assumptions. Locate each fact before making comparisons.
Study Resource
The town needs a school site outside the mapped flood area and within 15 minutes of homes.
| Site | In mapped flood area | Travel from homes (min) | Land cost (units) |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | Yes | 5 | 20 |
| B | No | 12 | 35 |
| C | No | 25 | 25 |
Vocabulary and Definition
- - a process or event that can cause harm
- - people or things located where a hazard may occur
- - conditions that make harm more likely or severe
Words to Learn
, ,
Sentences to Fill In
- The term for a process or event that can cause harm is .
- The term for people or things located where a hazard may occur is .
- The term for conditions that make harm more likely or severe is .
🧪 Think & Respond Q&A
Which site lies in the mapped flood area?
Which sites lie outside it?
Which has the shortest travel time?
Which has the lowest land cost?
What travel-time limit is stated?
Is this case an actual survey of a named real location?
What should an evidence-based answer include?
Which lesson word means "a process or event that can cause harm"?
Which lesson word means "people or things located where a hazard may occur"?
Which lesson word means "conditions that make harm more likely or severe"?
Hands-On Experiment or Activities
What You Need: Paper, pencil, and a calculator for checking arithmetic.
What You Do:
- Recommend a site under the stated rules. Write a short explanation that includes two pieces of evidence and one uncertainty.
- Share your result. Ask a partner to check the evidence and challenge one assumption.
- Revise one part of your work after checking it against the lesson evidence.
Think and Talk: What evidence supports one choice in your work?
Reflection
- Which idea can you explain now?
- What would you still need to learn about a real place?
Teacher Check
Check accurate use of the study resource, correct vocabulary or units, and a reason supported by evidence. For open activities, accept more than one result when it follows the instructions. The companion CSV contains the same numbered Q&A bank shown above.
Curriculum Reference
Original Grade 6 extension, Unit 5, Lesson 1. Builds on the map, environment, population, and planning skills in the Grade 1-4 course; no Grade 6 source book was supplied. The explanations, practice data, diagrams, activities, and questions in this lesson are original. Fictional datasets are labeled in their study resources.