Lesson video

Hi there.

Welcome to today's geography lesson.

I'm Ms. Roberts, and I'm really pleased that you've chosen to join me today, because this lesson is all about how to use a GIS, that's a geographic information system.

We're going to be using a GIS to investigate how we can use digital maps to identify our forests around the world.

So by the end of the lesson today, you will be able to use that GIS yourself and you're going to be able to identify where these different types of forests in our world are located using the GIS.

Are you ready? Me too.

Let's get started by looking at some of the key words that we're going to hear in today's lesson.

You're going to hear me use these words and you're going to be able to use them yourself as well.

That's what's important here, not just that you understand these words, but that you can use them too.

So first of all, you've already heard me mention this, geographic information system or GIS.

A GIS is something that contains lots of digital maps.

It's online.

Online, this system that we're going to be using today.

And those digital maps allow us to investigate geographical patterns that are happening over an area, be that a small area or a large area.

Digital maps are those maps that we can see or use on a computer as you are looking at a computer or maybe on a tablet or a smartphone.

They're maps that we see on screens.

Our next keyword is not actually to do with the map.

It's not a map feature.

It's a feature of the natural world around us, and this is a biome.

You may have heard of a biome before.

It is the name for an area, a space, quite a large space usually.

And within that space, the climate on average is the same in all places, the wildlife in all places is the same, and the vegetation in all places within that space is the same.

And together that area is known as a biome.

Our fourth key word for today is layer.

A layer in A GIS is a piece of information.

So a layer is something that we put on top of something else to help us to see a pattern or to find out something else.

In a GIS, we can use a base map and then put layers on top of it.

Now don't worry if that sounds a bit complicated at the moment.

We've got some videos to guide you through this today.

We've got two parts to today's lesson.

First half, we are going to think about how to use GIS to locate at our global forests.

And then in the second part, we're going to think about how GIS can help us to explain that location.

Why do we find those forests where we find them? So let's get started and think about how we can locate global forests.

Here we have three images of different types of forests that we can see around the world.

Aren't they beautiful? What do you notice about those photographs? Take a moment to look at the three different photographs carefully.

What differences can you see between each type of forest? The first picture was a picture of tropical rainforests.

Look at the really luscious, vibrant green color that you can see there in that forest.

The second picture was a type of forest called a temperate forest.

And the third picture was the boreal forests.

So each of these forests have different features, different types of trees like you can see here.

The trees are not the same in these photographs, are they? So let's just check that you are paying attention before we move on with this lesson.

Look at the pictures again, and can you tell me whether a, b or c is the temperate forest? Which one of those is it? Ready? It's option b, that forest in the middle.

You can see that big strong tree there.

So let's move along now and think about how we can use a GIS to think about our global forests.

A GIS is a set of digital maps.

It's a big bank of digital information.

And we can use that data to help us to investigate geographical patterns.

What you can see here is an example screenshot from a GIS, which is doing just that.

What do you think we are looking at on this digital map? What do you think it shows us? Did you notice that this map had a legend? The legend is another word for a key and a key tells us what things on the map represents.

In this case, we now know by looking at the legend that we are looking at a map showing us where volcanic eruptions have taken place.

And if you see all the red pins on the map, we can see there those are the places where the eruptions have happened.

This screenshot has come from something called the Geography Visualiser.

The Geography Visualiser is a free to access online GIS, and that's what we're going to use today to investigate our global forests.

Another teacher from Oak Academy, Mr. Schofield, has recorded a video introduction to how to use the Geography Visualiser.

So let's have a look at that together now.

<v Mr Schofield>In this video,</v> we're going to use the Geography Visualiser to locate different types of forest around the world.

Now a few things about the Geography Visualiser to get started.

First of all, if I want to move the map, all I need to do is hold the left button down of the mouse and drag it from one side to the other.

If I want to zoom in or out, I can use the scroll wheel of the mouse.

Or I can use these buttons on the left hand side to zoom in and out.

If I want to search for a place, I can use this little magnifying glass.

But a lot of the things that we're going to use today are in this bottom toolbar.

This is Basemaps, Open map, Map Layers.

Now what you are seeing at the moment is a satellite image of the world.

But on top of it is the borders of the countries and it's actually got names of some countries written on it as well.

And we call this an imagery hybrid map, and this is just one type of basemap.

I can change the basemaps so you see a different background map.

I want to by clicking on this 'Basemaps' button down here, but I'm not going to do that right now.

What I want to do though is I want to add a layer of data.

And the great things about GIS is that we can take data and create a map showing that data so that we can understand geographical patterns.

So the way I'm going to do that today is I'm going to click on this button at the bottom where it says 'Open map'.

And you can see lots of different map layers here, all with different types of data.

So it could be data about global cities and how big they are or about rainfall and temperature.

But we're not going to go on that.

I'm gonna use the scroll wheel of my mouse to go down and I'm going to click on where it says 'Schools Digital Atlas - Biomes'.

And there we go.

Once it comes on, you can see it's now changed to a just a satellite image of the world, but then it loads these colors onto the map.

So this is what we call a choropleth map, where we use colors to show different bits of data.

And this is actually showing the different biomes of the world.

And a biome is kind of a huge large ecosystem over a wide area with similar wildlife and plants.

But the problem is at the moment it does have these colors, but we don't really know what they are.

So what we need to do is we need to go to where it says 'Legend'.

And if I click on the 'Legend', we can see that the colors show different things.

The dark green, for example, is tropical forest.

And three of these biomes are types of forest.

The tropical forest, which is tropical rainforest, this dark green, temperate forest, which is kind of a light green color, and taiga, which is boreal forest and a coniferous forest, so you can imagine trees that keep their leaves all year round.

A good way of showing this actually is by clicking 'Interactive'.

And I can just put the three types of forests that we're going to look at today onto the map.

And you can see there now we've just got these tropical forests in the dark green, we've got a temperate forest in the light green, and the purple, which is taiga.

And they're much easier to see.

Now what we would like to do today is to give a location about where these different types of forests are.

And what we really need on this map at the moment are reference points, things we can use to help describe where these maps are, where these forests are.

So at the bottom toolbar, I'm going to click on 'Map layers' again.

And you'll see that everything's come back.

But I need to click on where it says 'Major Parallels and Meridians'.

I need to click on the visibility for this.

I'm going to click on this.

And what you will see is you'll suddenly see the equator, this yellow line just come across the middle.

You've got what we call the prime meridian, which runs through Greenwich in London.

We've got the Tropic of Cancer, the Tropic of Capricorn.

And if we zoom out, you can actually see the Arctic Circle and the Antarctic Circle.

And these are really useful for us because they help us to describe where these different forests are.

So if I go back to the legend and I click on 'Interactive' again, and I'm just going to put on the tropical forests for now, I'm gonna take off the taiga and the temperate forest and we're just going to have the tropical forests on.

And all of a sudden, it's a lot easier to see where these tropical forests are.

So look carefully, where do you think most of these tropical forests are in the world? What can we use to help describe? Yes, so I would say that the majority of the tropical forests are between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn.

So we don't get too many tropical forests north of the Tropic of Cancer and south of the Tropic of Capricorn.

So not all, but the majority of tropical forests we find around the equator and between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn.

And these are rainforests that we can imagine that we would find here.

Okay, let's do the same again with the temperate forest.

I'm gonna take off the tropical forest and just have the temperate forests on the map.

And we can see that we find them in what we call the southern hemisphere, south of the equator, and the northern hemisphere, north of the equator.

But they're not between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn anymore, are they? They're north of the Tropic of Cancer and south of the Tropic of Capricorn.

So I would say that temperate forests, so these are kind of mixed woodlands.

So in the UK, you would find things like oak and beech and birch woodlands in the UK.

We would find these in areas between the Tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle.

Get a few just north of that, but this is where you will find the vast majority and you will find the majority in the southern hemisphere between the Tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Circle.

And finally, let's just look at taiga, sometimes called boreal forest.

I'll take the temperate forest off and we put the taiga on.

And we zoom out here.

You'll see that all of this taiga is coniferous forest.

It's actually the northern hemisphere.

We don't have any in the south.

And it's pretty far north, isn't it? Now the majority is still between the Tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle, but now it does, you do get taiga boreal forests stretching north of the Arctic Circle as well.

But we can see that this, these are forests that you find in the far north of the world, in places like Canada and Russia.

So you can see here how GIS can be really useful for locating different forests about around the world and showing where they are.

<v ->Thanks Mr. Schofield.

</v> Gosh, that was so interesting, being able to click on the layers and then see the color shading on the map for the different types of forest.

It really helps us to see at a glance where those forests are found in our world.

So how much attention were you paying? Can you help me out with this quick multiple choice question? Look at the screenshot here.

What does this map show? Tropical forests, temperate forests, or boreal forests or taiga forests? It's option c, the boreal forest.

You can see that purple shading that goes all the way across those far northern areas, that's a special type of forest, the boreal forest or taiga forest, not to be confused with the stripey wild cat.

So we've got an activity now to give you an opportunity to work on the visualizer yourself.

So you're going to need internet access for this, and you are going to go through these step by step, okay? This may be a whole new system to you now, so don't forget you can come back to this screen and read these instructions at any time.

When you've done that, you will see that map of the world open up for you.

At the bottom, there's a toolbar with different icons, and in that toolbar you need to click on the one that says 'Open map'.

And you will have lots of different layers open up for you then to choose from.

You choose 'Schools Digital Atlas - Biomes' from that popup menu.

On that menu, you need to click 'Map layers' and then 'Toggle visibility'.

When you've clicked that checkbox for toggle visibility, you will see that you can click 'Major Parallels and meridians', okay? So checking that box, that will bring up the equator and the tropics for you on the map, so you can see those lines across the map.

If you then click on 'Legend' on that bottom from the bottom toolbar, you can select 'Interactive' from the menu, and then you can go between the different types of forest and you will see the shading appear and disappear as Mr. Schofield demonstrated in that video.

So you can select temperate, tropical, or tiger forests and you will see those biomes highlighted on the map.

When you finish doing that, having a good play around and a good practice looking at the forests, you can then complete part two of this task.

We have a paragraph here with some words that are missing.

I would like you to use your knowledge of forests using the GIS to complete the paragraph.

The words are provided for you in the word bank.

So pause the video now.

Don't forget, you can come back and look at the instructions on the previous slide at any time.

And when you are ready, I will have some examples and the answers to part two.

Ready? Did you enjoy using the visualizer yourself to look at forests? You should have started with some digital layers that looked like this.

Here we can see all the different shading for the different types of forests.

We have got those lines for the equator and the tropics.

And then moving on to the paragraph, we now have the words completed.

Most of the tropical forests in the world can be found between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn.

Temperate forests are mainly located between the Tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle in the northern hemisphere and between the Tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Circle in the southern hemisphere.

Taiga or boreal forests are only found in the northern hemisphere and they are often located close to the Arctic Circle.

Well done.

You've already learned an awful lot about the Geography Visualiser, but now we are going to move into the second half of this lesson and think about how GIS can help us to explain the locations of those forests.

As well as describing geographical patterns, we can also use the GIS to explain those patterns.

Describing something and explaining something are very different.

What do we do when we describe compared to when we explain? When we are describing something, what we are doing is saying what we see.

So here we have a cat.

We have a cat up a tree.

That's what we can see here.

We see the cat, we see the cat up the tree.

And that's what we do, we describe what we can see in the picture.

If we were asked to explain, then we would need to provide reasons.

So we would need to know why the cat is up the tree.

That would be the explanation.

The explanation could be something like, because it had to escape from a dog.

So describing is saying what we see and explaining is giving reasons for something.

So let's test our theory here.

Take a look at this picture.

And then we have Jacob and Jun here.

Jacob says, "This area has flooded." Jun says, "This area has flooded because of heavy rain." Who is describing the picture and who is explaining the picture? Maybe you could pause the video now and talk about this with a partner.

Have you decided which is which? Jacob is describing.

He says what he can see.

He can see an area that is flooded.

Well done, Jacob.

Jun is giving us an explanation.

He can see an area that is flooded and he is providing a reason why that flooding has occurred.

He is saying that the area has flooded because of heavy rainfall.

Well done, Jun.

We are going to look at another video now from Mr. Schofield, and this time we're going to think about how to use layers on the GIS to help us to explain the reasons for the location of those forests.

Now you may remember from our key words that a layer is something that we can put on top of a base map.

So let's watch the video now and find out some more about what those layers are.

<v Mr. Schofield>In this recording,</v> we are going to use the Geography Visualiser to help explain the location of the forest that we find around the world.

Now the first thing I'm going to do, I'm going to go back to the layer which shows the biomes around the world.

So the way I'm going to do that, I'm going to come to the bottom tool bar.

I'm going to click on 'Open map'.

I'm going to scroll down and I'm going to find this layer, 'Schools Digital Atlas - Biomes'.

I'm going to click that.

And you might already have that on your screen from before.

Now, this map was incredibly useful for us to describe the location of forest around the world.

But what I would now like to do is try and explain some of those patterns.

So why do we find tropical forests in this area between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn, for example? Now to do that, I need to compare where we find forests around the world with another layer of data.

So something else which might help us understand why tropical forests are found there.

Now, GIS, like The Geographic Visualiser, have got a really useful tool, which we can add multiple layers to our map.

So at the moment, you can see we've got two layers on our map.

We've got the world biomes layer and we've also got this other layer which says 'Major Parallels and Meridians'.

And that's the information, the data that I can put on this map.

But I can add another layer to this and I'm going to do this at the bottom.

So in the toolbar where it says 'Add layer', I'm going to click on this and we are going to see that there's a lot of different options that I can add.

If I scroll down, I'm going to add a layer which says 'Global Rainfall'.

I'm also going to add a layer which says 'Global Temperature 1981-2010'.

And you'll see that when I've done that, you can now see at the bottom of the toolbar where it says 'Map layers'.

There's absolutely number four next to it, and that means there are four layers that I can now visualize, I can see on this map.

So I'm going to close this layer.

And now you can see that the map has changed color.

And you can see that this is actually the rainfall layer that you can see on the map now.

If I click on the legend, it shows you here that a high precipitation, that means rainfall and could be snow and things, but, and if it's close to the equator, it'll certainly be rainfall.

So if it's high, lots of rainfall, it's going to be a dark blue color.

If it's really low, it's going to be a yellow color.

So that's what this map of the rainfall is showing us.

Now what I would like to do is I would like to compare this rainfall map with the map of where the tropical forests are located.

So to do this, I'm going to go to the bottom toolbar and I'm going to click on the 'Map layers' and I'm going to choose the ones that I want to see on the map.

So for now, I'm happy that the temperature's not ticked, but the rainforest ticked.

I'm happy that the Major Parallels and Meridians is ticked and you can see that the World Biomes is ticked.

but what I'm going to do is where it says 'Global Rainfall', if you look along all these buttons and you hover over each one, we've all got a specific meaning, and this one is called 'Swipe'.

I'm going to click on this 'Swipe' button.

And what that's done is it's now allowing me to swipe between two layers.

One layer is the biomes layer showing where the tropical forests are.

Then you can see that on the right here.

And the other layer is the global rainfall layer, which is over here on the left.

So if I drag this handle over to the left, you can see the tropical forest.

If I drag it over to the right, you can see the rainfall.

Now this is really useful for us because it allows us to compare the two.

So if we have a look at where the tropical forests are, these dark green areas here, what I want you to look at is what color are these areas when I drag this handle across to show the rainfall.

So look really carefully.

So I'm dragging now.

And you'll see these dark areas.

Look at 'em carefully.

What color are they all? Yeah, you've imagine you've seen that they're all really dark blue, showing that all these areas of tropical forests have actually got very high rainfall.

Now I can do the same with the temperature.

If I go on the temperature here, so I've taken the global rainfall off, I've put the temperature on.

I will just show you the legend on this.

And it shows that the yellow colors are the hottest and the dark red colors are the coldest.

So if I go back to the map layers, and this time I'm going to click on the Swipe for global temperature.

Again, we're just going to see, I want you to look really carefully, all these dark green areas where the tropical forests are, what color are they wen I drag the handle across? And what you can see, you can see that all these tropical forest areas are yellowy color, which means they're really hot.

So we've seen using GIS that these areas of tropical forest are hot and they are wet.

They get a lot of rainfall.

And that can help us understand why we get these tropical forests here, because we're getting a lot of rainfall, which is certainly good for plants, and a lot of sunlight and high temperatures, which, again, that's really good for plants.

So what you end up with is a really dense, thick forest with lots of different types of plants, and also because of that, lots of different animals who will be feeding off the plants.

So we can see here that GIS has helped us not just describe where the forests are, but also helped us explain where the forests are, and this tropical forest in particular.

<v ->Thanks Mr. Schofield.

</v> Wow, isn't it amazing just how much data we can get from a GIS and how we can put all that together to see those patterns, and then investigate the reasons for those patterns happening? So how much attention were you paying to Mr. Schofield? Can you tackle this multiple choice question for me? What does the 'Swipe' tool on the Geography Visualiser allow you to do? Does it mean that you can a, delete information on a map, b, switch easily between two different map layers, or c, add labels onto a map that you are using? Hmm, which of those is the correct option? Have you selected? It's option b, the 'Swipe' tool allows you to swipe between one layer and the next so you can see how things change across an area.

Now here is Jacob from Oak Academy and he's talking about using the Geography Visualiser.

He says that, "Swiping between the global biomes layer and the global rainfall layer shows that tropical forests grow in areas of low rainfall." Now, he's not quite right there, but what is the mistake that he's made? Read that through again and have a think.

Can you spot what we need to correct? Have you decided? Yes, Jacob's not quite right about the rainfall aspect of what he says.

It's areas of high rainfall.

Do you remember how those areas change to that very dark blue color for areas of high rainfall where we find those tropical forests? So time for another activity to get you used to using the Geography Visualiser and all of those layers yourself.

Again, you can come back to this slide and look at these instructions at any time.

So don't be worried about making mistakes or starting again.

Click the 'Open map' button from the toolbar at the bottom and click on 'Schools Digital Atlas - Biomes' in the pop-up menu.

you might already have this open from task A earlier in this lesson.

Now click on the toolbar where it says 'Add layer'.

And from those layer options, select 'global rainfall 81-2010'.

Also, select 'Global Temperature 81 to 2010'.

You can click the plus sign next to them and they will be selected.

Then click on 'Map layers' in the bottom toolbar, and this is the point where you can start using that 'Swipe' tool and you can use that to swipe between those layers.

So you can swipe between global rainfall and the biome to compare the biome and the rainfall maps to see what rainfall is like in the tropical forests.

So follow that through.

Do that a few times to get yourself used to using the visualizer.

Then part two of this task, I would like you to do exactly the same thing as you've been doing for tropical forests, but now I want you to think about the boreal forests, the taiga forests.

Use the layers, use the temperature layers, use the rainfall and try and find some reasons why taiga forests are located where they are found.

Write down some notes about what you discover and talk to a partner about it.

Pause the video.

Remember, you can read these instructions at any time to help you if you forget quite what to do.

And then when you come back and you've finished, I'll share some examples with you.

Good luck and enjoy.

Have you finished? Good job.

Okay, so to begin with, we have an example here of a screenshot showing us the different layers.

Did you see the same thing? This is how it looked for Aisha from Oak Academy.

She says that, "Tropical rainforests are found in areas where there is a lot of rain and high temperatures." And she can see that clearly by using the 'Swipe' tool and seeing how things change on the layers.

For part two, we asked you to investigate the taiga or boreal forests.

Here's an example answer from one of the Oak Academy children.

"Taiga forests are found in the northern hemisphere, mostly between the Tropic of Cancer and the Arctic Circle.

These areas have small amounts of rainfall and very cold temperatures so only coniferous trees can survive in this environment and grow there." You may have had similar ideas to these.

And that brings us to the end of this lesson about using a GIS to investigate our global forests.

Now, you can say that the Geography Visualiser is a tool that you can use to locate different types of forests around the world.

You can use that GIS to describe and explain geographical patterns.

Remember, describing and explaining are not the same thing.

You can use the Geography Visualiser tools within the GIS like the map layers and swiping to investigate those forests.

And you can use the GIS to help you to see links.

In this case, we've seen links between climate, temperature, and rainfall in those areas of forests.

There is so much that we can do with a GIS.

This is just one example.

I hope you've enjoyed today's lesson, and I look forward to seeing you next time for another exciting geography lesson.

Bye for now.