Factors affecting flood risk
Lesson details
Learning outcome
I can explain the physical and human factors that affect flood risk, and why flood risk is increasing.
Key learning points
- Physical and human factors increase flood risk.
- Increased flood risk is due to several factors including increased storm frequency (and intensity) and land use change.
- Increased river flooding threatens people and the environment.
Keywords
Flood risk - the probability of a flood event occurring and its potential impact
Relief - physical shape or features of the land's surface
Urbanisation - the increase in the proportion of people living in cities and towns, often impacting natural land
Climate change - long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns, often linked to human activity
Common misconception
The only factor affecting flood risk is rainfall.
Whether a river floods in response to heavy rainfall also relates to many other factors, especially how quickly and in what volume rainfall enters the river.
Teacher tip
To ensure pupils have a full understanding of these factors it is useful to link it to the storm hydrograph - thinking about the impact on lag time and peak discharge.
Licence
Lesson video
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Prior knowledge starter quiz
6 Questions
Q1.Which river process involves the wearing down of the river's bed and banks?
Q2.Which landform is created by deposition in a river's lower course?
Q3.What does a storm hydrograph show?
Q4.What happens to a river’s velocity as it moves from the upper course to the lower course?
Q5.Which of these river landforms is typically found in the upper course?
Q6.What is the term for the process where materials carried by the river are dropped when the river slows down?
Assessment exit quiz
4 Questions
Q1.How does urbanisation increase flood risk?
Q2.How does deforestation contribute to flood risk?
Q3.Which human activity can help reduce flood risk?
Q4.What role does geology and soil type play in flood risk?
To help you plan your 10 geography lesson on: Factors affecting flood risk, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs...
To help you plan your 10 geography lesson on: Factors affecting flood risk, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs.
The starter quiz will activate and check your pupils' prior knowledge, with versions available both with and without answers in PDF format.
We use learning cycles to break down learning into key concepts or ideas linked to the learning outcome. Each learning cycle features explanations with checks for understanding and practice tasks with feedback. All of this is found in our slide decks, ready for you to download and edit. The practice tasks are also available as printable worksheets and some lessons have additional materials with extra material you might need for teaching the lesson.
The assessment exit quiz will test your pupils' understanding of the key learning points.
Our video is a tool for planning, showing how other teachers might teach the lesson, offering helpful tips, modelled explanations and inspiration for your own delivery in the classroom. Plus, you can set it as homework or revision for pupils and keep their learning on track by sharing an online pupil version of this lesson.
Explore more key stage 4 geography lessons from the River landscapes unit, dive into the full secondary geography curriculum, or learn more about lesson planning.