Undergraduate - UnitAZA1308 - Introduction to Physical Geography

This unit entry is for students who completed this unit in 2015 only. For students planning to study the unit, please refer to the unit indexes in the the current edition of the Handbook. If you have any queries contact the managing faculty for your course or area of study.

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6 points, SCA Band 1, 0.125 EFTSL

Refer to the specific census and withdrawal dates for the semester(s) in which this unit is offered.

Level	Undergraduate
Faculty	Faculty of Arts
Organisational Unit	South Africa School of Social Sciences
Offered	South Africa Second semester 2015 (Day)
Coordinator(s)	Mr Marshall Mdoka

Synopsis

This unit deals with the basic understanding of the landscape, vegetation and climate characteristics of the world as a foundation for more advanced study in geography and related disciplines. It explains patterns of landforms, soil, biota and climate throughout the earth's surface.

Outcomes

Upon satisfactory completion of the unit, students will be:

Able to understand the major ideas concerning the evolution of the earth's landscape, its biota and climate patterns.
Able to understand the present day distribution of the world's climate, biota, soils and landscapes with special emphasis on the African environment.
Able to synthesise and interpret relevant material and to communicate ideas to others in a coherent manner, by either written or verbal means.
Familiar and proficient with some simple techniques for analysing basic geographic and physical environmental information. eg. Air photo interpretation, Satellite Remote sensing, map interpretation, GIS and basic statistical techniques.
Able to undertake an independent field study of the natural environment and understand the problems associated with making field measurements of natural phenomena.

Assessment

Within semester assessment: 50%
Exam: 50%

Workload requirements

Minimum total expected workload to achieve the learning outcomes for this unit is 144 hours per semester typically comprising a mixture of scheduled learning activities and independent study. A unit requires on average three/four hours of scheduled activities per week. Scheduled activities may include a combination of teacher directed learning, peer directed learning and online engagement.

Chief examiner(s)

Mr Marshall Mdoka

This unit applies to the following area(s) of study

Geography and environmental science (ARTS)

Prohibitions

ATS1308