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World Geography
Lesson Activities
Student Answer Sheet
Physical Geography
The Lesson Activities will help you meet these educational goals:
Inquiry Skills—You will analyze societal issues, trends, and events; apply reasoning that
requires spatial and environmental perspectives; develop explanations and make
persuasive arguments in support of your conclusions; and identify and analyze real-world
public problems.
Directions
Please save this document before you begin working on the assignment. Type your
answers directly in the document.
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Self-Checked Activities
Read the instructions for the following activities and type in your responses. At the end of the
lesson, click the link to open the Student Answer Sheet. Use the answers or sample
responses to evaluate your work.
1. Pangaea
Alfred Wegener’s 1912 theory states that a single consolidated continent (which Wegener
termed Pangaea) existed before tectonic activity split it into our modern continents.
a. Study the following two images carefully, comparing Pangaea to the map of the
modern continents. Then use the table to catalog at least three clues and observations
that support Wegener’s theory.
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Pangaea (more than 2 million years ago)
map of continents (present day)
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Sample answer:
Continent /
Landmass
South America
Clue
Explanation
The east coast mirrors
that of the west coast of
Africa.
North America
The east coast mirrors
roughly the scale and
shape of the northwest
coast of Africa
Europe
The west coast has
shapes that cluster well
with parts of North
America.
Intermediate landmasses
appear to come from
larger continents.
Of all the continents, South America
and Africa most clearly appear to fit
together and, therefore, were likely
one landmass in the past.
Thinking of the continents as puzzle
pieces, the eastern coast of the
United States appears to have once
curled up against the coasts of
Morocco and Western Sahara.
The landmasses of Greenland and
northern Canada appear to fit with
Scandinavia, the United Kingdom,
and other parts of northern Europe.
Some islands cluster close to larger
continents and seem like pieces that
have broken off from the continents.
In addition, larger, more spread out
islands sometimes form chains
between continents that appear to be
intermediate parts of the former
Pangaea.
Islands
b. Now, drawing on your prior knowledge, make a list of other types of evidence not
visible on a map that might support Wegener’s Pangaea theory. What other methods
could you use to investigate this theory?
Sample answer:
1. You could look for fossils of ancient plants or animals that appear on matching
coasts of paired continents.
2. You could look for landforms like mountain ranges that would fit together if two
continents were matched up side by side.
3. You could look for mineral deposits that two continents have in common, despite
having different modern geographic conditions.
4. You could look for fossils that indicate that a continent used to be in a different
climate zone than it is now (for example, if Antarctica had ancient fossils of tropical
species).
5. You could track movements of modern continents using GPS to project backward
in time and estimate where and when they might have been one larger landmass.
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2. Dust Bowl
In the 1930s, a severe drought in the southwestern Great Plains of the United States
produced soil conditions known as the Dust Bowl. This event lives in the memories of
farmers who experienced it and continues to influence policy makers in the United States
when issues of irrigation, farming, and land use come up for discussion.
Investigate how the underlying physical geography interacted with human geography
during the Dust Bowl to bring about geographic change and human hardship. Skim this
resource and work through this activity. Use them to track some of the problems
Americans faced in the Dust Bowl region. Make note of each problem’s cause and
whether it was natural or human-made, and briefly describe the resulting condition.
Sample answer:
Soil problem
grassland
destroyed
grassland
destroyed
farmland
expanded
Natural Cause
erosion
strong winds
erosion
dry soil
Human Cause
dryland farming
Resulting condition
environmental damage
overgrazing of
animals
wheat prices
increased during
World War I
bare land
new, faster plowing
methods
1930 drought
rapid expansion of
farming
clouds of dust and
dust storms
field furrows no longer
holding soil in place
farmer migrations to
the West
3. Land Formations
Tectonic processes, erosion, and sedimentary processes create, alter, and destroy land
formations all over our planet. Land formations that share common traits are identified and
named based on the processes that have affected them. Use this review of land
formations to create definitions in your own words of five types of land formations: plain,
plateau, cave, mountain, canyon. Be sure to include the basic features of each land
formation and how it is created. The first one has been done for you.
Sample answer:
Plain
 Definition – wide-open stretches of land with minimal changes in elevation
 Basic features –broad and flat; often have rich soil
 How it is created – Glaciers erode elevated terrain, magma pushes up through Earth’s
crust, or repeated floods carry muddy sediment to build up plains in river valleys.
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Plateau
 Definition – an elevated, flat, open area of mostly rock
 Basic features – high elevations and uplifted crust, but no crumples or wrinkles, which
often show signs of erosion that formed buttes, mesas, and canyons
 How it is created – As two tectonic plates collide, magma pushes the crust upward but
does not break the surface, instead raising a large, impenetrable rock formation;
sometimes lava flows spill out repeatedly from cracks in Earth’s crust and spread out
broadly to form plateaus.
Cave
 Definition – underground passages that expand to form open spaces within rock
 Basic features – typically dark, often wet, with spikes of rock drooping from the roof
(stalactites) or growing from the ground (stalagmites), usually formed from a type of
limestone called karst
 How it is created – Acidic rain seeps into rock, slowly dissolving some of it and
creating passages that later expand to larger spaces as more water washes through
them.
Mountain
 Definition – an area of rock that rises 1,000 feet (305 meters) or more above its
surrounding area
 Basic features – steeply sloping sides with both rounded and sharp ridges
 How it is created – Tectonic plates collide, forming buckles, cracks and faults in
Earth’s crust from the force of the collision; magma sometimes pushes large rocks up
from below, forming cracks and steep mountain slopes; magma also flows from
volcanoes as lava, slowly building up the sides of volcanic mountains.
Canyon
 Definition – narrow valleys with steep sides
 Basic features – deep, usually rocky valley with high cliffs, often cut into dry plateaus
 How it is created – Flowing water, such as a river, cuts deeply into layers of rock,
eroding each successive layer over long periods of time; ocean canyons are cut by
torrents of water flowing in ocean currents.
4. Wetland Facts
Review these facts about wetlands, and familiarize yourself with the types of wetlands.
a. Identify a wetland in or bordering your community. Perhaps there is a pond near your
house or behind your school. Maybe a marshy creek connects your town to a
neighboring town. Maybe you live near a bay or port with surrounding wetlands. Or
perhaps some bogs or swamps are on the outskirts of your town. Take some notes
about your local wetland below. If you do not have a wetland in your community, use
the Florida Everglades as your example.
Sample answer:
 Wetland name – Florida Everglades
 Type of wetland – The Everglades are a mix of freshwater marshes (slough) and
brackish or saline tidal marshes (estuarine).
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

Description – It is a large ecosystem with multiple habitats, some of which are
wetlands. Animals such as manatees, alligators, and panthers, as well as wading
birds like the ibis, are unique residents of the Everglades. The soil beneath its
swamps and estuaries are often limestone, deposited as silt and sand 6 million
years ago, when the area was a shallow sea. The freshwater flowing out of the
Everglades mixes with salt water along the coast to produce a nutrient-rich
mangrove estuary filled with shrimp, snapper, and other sea life.
Other notes – Levees and canals were built through the Everglades to support
agriculture. Coastal development for homes and tourism has damaged shoreline
ecosystems. These human changes to the Everglades have made the system
more fragile than it was 200 years ago.
b. Now, imagine that the wetland you described is destroyed. Perhaps an oil spill
damages it, or a major storm disrupts it. Or maybe the construction of new housing
resulted in the wetland being filled. In a short paragraph, describe how your
neighborhood would change after the wetland’s destruction.
Sample answer:
If the Everglades suffered serious destruction, the habitats for so many animals—such
as manatees, panthers, and alligators—would be destroyed. As a result, these animal
populations would be stressed and would likely die off. Perhaps new species would
take over in numbers that could impact life in communities like Naples or Miami.
There would also be less open land to purify water, so runoff from farms in the area
would more quickly make its way to the ocean, damaging ecosystems along popular
beaches. This damage could impact tourism in the area.
When hurricanes or other heavy rains occur, communities in the area would have
more flooding because the wetlands would not be there to absorb excess runoff and
standing water. Soil erosion could become a problem too, with a great impact on farms
and orchards around the Everglades. Soil erosion could lead to diminishing agricultural
production.
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