Lesson video

Hello, my name is Mr. March and I'm here today to teach you all about the climate of Nigeria.

So, grab everything that you need for today's lesson and let's get going.

So by the end of today's lesson, you will be able to explain Nigeria's climate zones and interpret patterns in climate data.

There are five key terms for today's lesson, and those are climate, geographic information system, latitude, monsoon, and altitude.

Climate refers to an average of weather conditions.

For example, rain, sun, wind in a place taken over over a long period of time, usually 30 years or more.

Geographic information systems is well, it is a computer mapping system that captures and displays geographic data to help understand spatial patterns.

And it's also referred to as GIS.

Latitude refers to imaginary lines on earth showing position north or south of the equator, and it's measured in degrees.

Monsoon refers to a seasonal change in wind direction that brings a very rainy season or a very dry season.

And finally, altitude refers to height above sea level or ground level.

There are two learning cycles for today's lesson.

I'm gonna start with learning cycle one, which is interpreting climate data.

Now, Lucas and Sam are having a discussion.

You need to decide who is correct.

Let's read through their statements then.

Well, Lucas says that, "Climate is the average weather conditions for a given place over a long period of time.

While Sam, she says that, "Climate is what the weather conditions are like when I look outside my window." You may like to pause the video here whilst you debate your own answer to that question or perhaps even discuss it with someone near you.

But the answer we're looking for is what Lucas says.

Lucas says that climate is the average weather conditions for a given place over a long period of time.

So, it's not the day-to-day weather conditions as Sam says.

It's actually the weather conditions over a long period of time, usually 30 years.

So, climate is an average of weather conditions in a place over a long period of time.

As I said, usually 30 years or more.

The weather of a place describes the more day-to-day changes or conditions in the atmosphere.

So, what sources of data could we use to investigate Nigeria's climate? Again, you may like to pause the video here whilst you consider your own answer to that question or perhaps even discuss it with someone near you.

So, we're now to a learning check.

It says true or false? The climate of a place describes the day-to-day conditions of the atmosphere.

So, what I need you to do then now is pause the video here whilst you decide whether this statement is true or false.

And the correct answer was false.

Now, once again, I'd like you to pause the video whilst to consider as to why this statement is false.

And the reason it's false is because climate is an average of weather conditions in a place over a long period of time, usually 30 years or more.

Meanwhile, the weather of a place describes those day-to-day differences and the conditions of the atmosphere.

So really, really well done if you're able to identify those two correct answers.

We can also use a geographic information system or GIS to actually investigate Nigeria's climate with a bit more detail.

This map in front of you shows annual average temperature.

Now, the darker the shading, the lower the average temperature.

So, now we can begin to get a sense of where places are cooler and where places are warmer by looking at this map and identifying those different colours.

For example, the average annual temperature in Nigeria is up at around 27 degrees.

Meanwhile, compare that with the climate or the temperature of the UK, for example, which we can see in that orange colour.

And we're looking at a temperature, an average temperature of around 12 degrees perhaps.

And so, we can really get a sense of the differences between the UK and the Nigeria in terms of its temperature.

Now, the following map is going to show you annual precipitation in Nigeria.

And precipitation just refers to moisture falling from the atmosphere.

So for example, rainfall.

Let's have a look at that map right now.

So, it says areas shaded in blue have high rainfall whilst areas shaded in yellow have very low rainfall.

So, I have a quick question for you.

It says, what patterns do you notice? Now, you may like to pause the video here whilst you study that map in front of you and look for any patterns, perhaps even using compass directions in your answer.

So once again, you may like to pause the video here whilst you study that map and perhaps even discuss it with someone near you.

So, what did you find? Well, look at what Aisha said.

Aisha has said that "Rainfall is highest in the south of Nigeria and lowest in the north." And that's absolutely spot on.

We can see via the blue colour in front of you that the highest amount of precipitation or rainfall is found in those southern areas of Nigeria whilst the lowest is up in the north as indicated by that yellow colour.

So really, really well done if you too were able to identify those sort of features on that map.

We can also use climate graphs to investigate the climate in Nigeria, and we have a climate graph in front of you of the capital city of Nigeria, Lagos.

Now, I have two questions for you to consider.

It says, "What is a climate graph?" and "What data does it show?" You may like to pause the video here whilst you study that climate graph in front of you and perhaps look at the X axis and the Y axis you can see there in front of you, to try and break down and perhaps try to understand what it is that a climate graph is actually showing you.

Well, what did you get? Let's have a look at what a climate graph actually is.

A climate graph shows how rainfall and temperature change during the year in a particular location.

Now, as I said, we are looking at the capital city of Nigeria, which is Lagos.

Let's try and understand this climate graph in a little bit more detail.

The line graph, which you can see there shown in red is showing us how temperature changes each and every month across the 12 months of the year.

Meanwhile, rainfall is shown in the bars, the bar chart there, and again, it's showing us how rainfall changes each and every single month.

So, the line once again shows the average temperature and the bars show the average rainfall.

So, you're getting sort of two graphs for the price of one.

One line graph showing temperature and one bar chart showing rainfall.

So, a quick learning check.

It says, "Climate graphs show?" What you need to do then is pause the video here whilst you read through those three options and decide what you think is correct, And the answer was B.

So, a climate graph shows the average temperature and rainfall of a place.

Really, really well done if you're able to select B as the correct answer.

Our next learning check says, "To read rainfall on a climate graph we look at the?" And once again, you have three options in front of you.

And once again, I'd like you to pause the video here whilst you read through those three options and then decide on your answer.

And the correct answer was A, bars.

Really, really well done if you're able to identify A as the correct answer.

Now, this climate graph in front of you is from a city called Port Harcout, a large coastal city in the south of Nigeria.

Now, once again, I have two questions for you.

I want you to try to identify any patterns that you can see in the data in front of you by analysing that climate graph you can see on the right hand side.

And the second question is how would you actually describe this climate? So, you may like to pause the video here whilst you study that climate graph in front of you and try to analyse any patterns and trying to think about how you would describe its climate.

So, analysing the climate graph, then we can see that there is a clear rainy season from around March time to November with heavy rainfall.

I mean, we can see that on the climate graph there by looking at the increase in height of those bars, once again indicating an increase in the amount of rainfall.

There is also very small temperature range as temperatures remain almost consistent and consistently high actually throughout the whole year.

We can see that by looking at that line graph.

And we can see that temperatures on average are around 25 to 28 degrees consistently throughout the whole year.

As Jacob says, "Annual rainfall is above 2,000 millimetres.

And that's around three times the annual rainfall that's felt in Manchester." So, we really get a sense of how wet actually the climate is in certain parts of Nigeria, particularly the south.

Now, this climate graph comes from a city called Ilorin, and it's a city in the western part of Nigeria.

Now, once again, I have the two same questions for you.

It says, "What patterns are shown in this data?" And second of all is "How would you describe this climate?" So once again, you may like to pause the video here whilst you study that climate graph that you can see on the right hand side, and do your best to actually answer those two questions that you can see in front of you.

So, what did you get? Well, we can see that there is a clear rainy season from April to October, which is slightly different from our previous climate graph, which was from March to November.

And there is a clear dry season.

This is the biggest difference between our previous climate graph.

We can see a clear dry season from November to March.

Look at how the height of those bars completely drops between those months, indicating a distinct and clear dry season, which must be felt in the western part of Nigeria.

Temperatures vary but remain consistently high all year round.

And March is the warmest month and August is the coldest.

Now, this climate graph is from a city called Maiduguri.

It's a large city in the northeast region of Nigeria.

And once again, we have the same two questions.

What patterns are actually shown in this data and how would you describe this climate? So once again, you may like to pause the video here whilst you study that climate graph in front of you and do your best to answer those two questions that you see in front of you as well.

Well, what did you get for those two questions then? In terms of Maiduguri's climate, it's very different from what we saw before.

There is very little rainfall for actually much of the year.

And August is clearly the wettest month throughout the whole year.

Temperatures vary during the year but remain above 20 degrees Celsius.

So, we see here the biggest variation in terms of temperatures across those different climate grass that we looked at.

But nevertheless, the climate is still warm consistently throughout the year.

And then, of course, with regards to the rainfall, we see a clear wet month.

But generally throughout the whole year, it is generally rather rather dry.

Now, April is the warmest month.

January and December are the coldest months that we can also identify on the climate graph in front of you.

So, a quick learning check.

It says, "Which of these places has almost no rainfall for much of the year?" You can see those three different climate graphs, which we've looked at A, B, and C.

What you need to do then is pause the video here whilst you study those climate graphs and then select your answer.

And the correct answer was C.

Really, really well done if you're able to identify C as the correct answer.

We're on now to our practise tasks and we have two practise questions.

And the first practise question says, "Use the data to construct a climate graph for Lagos, a large coastal city in southeastern Nigeria." So, there we can see the data that you would need to use in order to construct that climate graph.

And then, the second question says for you to interpret the data, and there are three separate questions.

The first one says, "Which is the wettest month?" The second says, "Which is the warmest month?" And the third says, "Describe the climate of Lagos." So, what you need to do right now is pause the video here whilst to attempt these two practise tasks.

Best of luck.

In terms of feedback then, here is the completed climate graph for Lagos.

What you need to do then right now is perhaps pause the video whilst to compare your own construction of that climate graph against the one you can see in front of you.

In terms of the answers for the second practise task then, these are the correct answers.

For 2a then, June is clearly the wettest month.

For 2b, March is clearly the warmest month.

And 2c, that a description of Lagos' climate.

Well, Lagos has a rainy season from around April to October, whilst temperatures remain consistently high all year round.

So really, really well done if you're able to include anything like that in your own answer.

We're now to our second and final learning cycle.

And this is all about explaining Nigeria's climactic variations.

We have many, many different factors as to what may affect climate.

And Lucas, Jacob, Sam, and Aisha all have their own answer for this question.

Lucas says, "Well, places closer to the equator are warmer than places further away." Aisha says, "How high a place is affects the climate.

It is colder at the top of a mountain than at the bottom." Jacob says, "The prevailing wind direction might affect the climate." And Sam, she says, "Well, the distance from the sea or ocean can also affect what the climate of a place is like." And these four statements are all correct, and we're gonna try to spend a little bit of time analysing and understanding how each of these four different factors affect Nigeria's climate.

Now, most of Nigeria we can see has a tropical climate due to its location near the equator.

It is located between the tropic of Cancer to the north and tropic of Capricorn to the south.

And actually, as I said previously, it is located extremely close to the equator.

Now, as a result of this, and well, latitude affects what a climate of a place is actually like.

Let's try to understand that in a bit more detail.

Because at the equator, the sun's rays are more concentrated, so temperatures are higher.

At the poles, the sun's rays are much more spread out over a wider area, so temperatures are lower.

So, we need to try to understand that the closer to the equator location is, the warmer it's going to be because the sun's rays, the sun's energy is much more concentrated or focused over a smaller area.

Nigeria does have three different main climate zones.

Let's try to understand these right now.

So, we can look at the key in front of you.

And we can see that in the very north we have a warm desert climate.

Beneath that or to the south of that, then we have a warm semi-arid climate.

We also have a tropical savanna climate.

And finally, in the very south we have a monsoon climate, which is the wettest climate that we will find in Nigeria.

So, a tropical climate.

We find this monsoon area in the south.

A tropical climate in most of the central regions, as well as a hot desert and a semi-arid climate in the north.

So, much more dry in the northern parts of Nigeria.

Now, we need to understand that Nigeria has two seasons during the year.

A dry season and a wet season.

Now rainfall, as we know from previous learning, the rainfall is highest in southern Nigeria, which experiences a tropical monsoon climate.

And a monsoon is just a wind pattern that causes a significant change in rainfall.

Now, in the wet season, if we look at the map for just a moment.

In the wet season, wind's blowing from the southwest as we can see in the map there in front of you, brings moisture up from the South Atlantic Ocean, which causes high rainfall during those months.

In the dry season though, the predominant, the dominant wind blows from the northeast.

Once again, we can see that in the map in front of you, which brings a dry and dusty air over Nigeria.

This wind is known as the Harmattan.

The Harmattan blows over the Sahara, picking up fine dust and sand particles before it reaches West Africa.

And this therefore goes some way to explaining this dry season that Nigeria experiences.

The northern part of Nigeria is located within an area, a very dry and arid area, known as the Sahel.

Now, this area known as the Sahel is shown on the map in front of you.

And you can see, it's that band stretching from one side of Africa to the other.

It's a semi-arid region of west and north Central Africa.

And the image in front of you does a great job in actually illustrating what this area is like.

So, time now for a learning check and it says, "Sam's explaining how latitude affects the climate.

You need to find and correct her mistake." So, I'd like you to do that, is pause a video here whilst you attend this learning check.

Okay, and the answer, well, Sam says that "Further from the equator, the sun's rays are more spread out so temperatures are higher." Well, the answer or the correction needed to be made at the end of that statement.

It isn't higher, it's actually lower.

"Further from the Equator, the sun's rays are more spread out, so temperatures are lower," they are colder.

Really, really well done if you're able to identify and correct that mistake.

Our next learning check says, "Which two statements correctly describes the Harmattan?" You have now four statements, and what you need to do then is pause the video here whilst you read through those statements and then select two correct answers.

And the correct answers you were looking for were A, blows from the northeast, and C, dry and dusty wind.

Really, really well done if you're able to identify those two correct answers.

Climate is also affected by altitude.

Altitude refers to the height above sea level.

So, higher land is cooler and wetter.

Approximately every 100 metres we gain in altitude or in height, the temperature drops by roughly one degree Celsius.

The highlands along the border between Nigeria and Cameroon have a temperate climate with cooler temperatures and more moderate rainfall.

Chappal Wadi, also known as Gangirawal or the Mountain of Death is the highest mountain in Nigeria with an altitude of 2,419 metres.

And again, this altitude effect goes some way to explaining why some parts of Nigeria will be cooler and wetter.

Cooler temperatures are also found in the highlands in Central Nigeria as you can see on the map in front of you.

Now, the Jos Plateau is an area of higher flat land located near the centre of Nigeria.

Once again, it has a tropical climate but is cooler than the surrounding lowlands, and it's all to do with this altitude effect.

Now, distance from the sea or ocean also influences the climate because places which are closer to the sea often have a cooler or wetter climate than those which are found further inland.

For example, Nigeria has a really long extensive coastline in the south where it is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean.

Lagos on the coast receives much more rainfall than cities further inland, such as Ibadan and Ilorin.

Now, a quick learning check.

It says, "True or false? All of Nigeria has a tropical monsoon climate." What you need to do then is pause the video here whilst you consider this statement and then consider whether it is true or false.

And the correct answer is false.

Now, once again, what you need to do then is pause the video here whilst you consider as to why this statement is false.

And the reason it's false is because well, although southern Nigeria absolutely has a tropical monsoon climate, the climate varies in other parts of the country.

Most of the central regions of the country have a tropical savanna climate whilst the north has a hot desert and semi-arid climate.

So really, really well done if you're able to identify those two correct answers.

So, run now to our final practise task for our final learning cycle.

And it says, "Izzy has answered the question, 'How and why does Nigeria's climate vary?' but she's made eight mistakes." What you need to do then is find and correct each and every one of those eight mistakes.

So, in front of you then, at the bottom of the screen, you can see the beginning of her answer.

And now you see the second and final part of her answer.

So, what you need to do then now is pause the video whilst you try to identify and correct those eight mistakes.

Best of luck.

So in terms of feedback, here is a corrected version of Izzy's answer.

It says that "Most of Nigeria has a tropical climate due to its location near the Equator.

At the Equator, the sun's rays are more concentrated, so temperatures are higher.

Nigeria has three main climate zones: a tropical monsoon climate in the south, a tropical savanna climate in central regions, and a hot desert and semi-arid climate in the north.

Nigeria has two seasons, dry and wet.

In the wet season, winds blow from the southwest bringing moisture from the South Atlantic Ocean.

And this causes rainfall over much of the country.

In the dry season, winds blow from the northeast, bringing dry and dusty air over Nigeria." It continues.

"Altitude affects the climate.

Higher land is cooler and wetter.

The highlands in the centre of Nigeria and along the country's eastern border with Cameroon have a cooler climate than the surrounding lowlands.

Distance from the sea or ocean also influences Nigeria's climate.

Nigeria has a long coastline in the south, and places closer to the coast generally have a cooler and wetter climate than those further inland." So really, really well done if you're able to identify those eight mistakes and correct them.

And as Izzy says, "Perhaps you could go online and actually investigate climate data for other places in Nigeria!" We're now to our learning summary.

What you need to know from today's lesson.

Well, Nigeria has a tropical and semi-arid climate zones and rainfall is certainly highest in the south and lowest in the north.

The country experiences both a wet and dry season, and climate varies due to a number of different factors such as latitude, altitude, and proximity to the sea.

And here we can see that map of Nigeria with those different climate zones.

So, in the south we can see a tropical monsoon climate.

Further north, we can see a tropical savanna climate at most of the central regions.

And then finally, in that northeastern areas, we can see both a hot desert and semi-arid climate.

So really, really well done during today's lesson.

It was a pleasure teaching you and I will see you again on the next lesson.

Goodbye.