These eight questions use original, invented data. They mix the topics in physical geography and ramp from naming to explaining.
Write your own answer first, then open the explanation.
Questions
Question 1: Plates on either side of an underwater ridge move apart and magma rises in the gap. Name the boundary and the process.
Answer
The boundary is divergent. Magma rising through the gap cools and adds new crust to both plates, building a mid-ocean ridge.
Question 2: Classify each rock by formation: granite (cooled from magma), limestone (compacted layers of shell fragments), marble (limestone changed by heat and pressure).
Answer
Granite is igneous. Limestone is sedimentary. Marble is metamorphic, because heat and pressure changed an existing rock without melting it.
Question 3: A rock on a bare hillside cracks after repeated heating by day and cooling by night. Name the process, and say how it differs from erosion.
Answer
It is physical weathering, because the rock breaks without being moved. Erosion involves a moving agent such as water or waves that wears away and carries material.
Question 4: A river is 12 m wide, with an average depth of 1.5 m and a flow speed of 0.8 m per second. Find the discharge in m³ per second.
Answer
Discharge = width × depth × speed = 12 × 1.5 × 0.8 = 14.4 m³ per second.
Question 5: Monthly rainfall (mm) at an original station in five months is 150, 210, 70, 240 and 90. Find the mean and the median.
Answer
Sum: 150 + 210 + 70 + 240 + 90 = 760, so the mean is 760 ÷ 5 = 152 mm.
Ordered: 70, 90, 150, 210, 240, so the median is 150 mm.
Question 6: An original beach runs west to east, with the sea to the south. Waves travel from the south-west towards the north-east. Give the net direction of sediment movement.
Answer
Swash carries sediment up the beach towards the north-east, which shifts it east. Backwash returns straight down, to the south. The net movement is eastwards.
Question 7: Heavy rain soaks a steep slope of loose soil, and a section slides downhill. Write a three-step explanation.
Answer
- Rain soaks the soil, which adds weight and reduces friction between the grains.
- The extra weight and lower friction mean gravity can overcome the resistance on the steep slope.
- The soil slides downhill as mass movement, and is left in a heap at the base.
Question 8: Pebbles measured at three river points are 14 cm, 7 cm and 3 cm going downstream, and become rounder. Quote the evidence and name the process.
Answer
“Pebble size falls from 14 cm to 3 cm, a drop of 11 cm, and the pebbles become rounder downstream, which suggests attrition as they knock against each other and the bed.”
If you got these wrong
Question 1 links to plate movement and tectonic processes. Question 2 links to rocks and rock cycle reasoning. Questions 3 and 7 link to weathering and mass movement.
Questions 4 and 8 link to river processes and connecting processes with observed features. Question 5 links to interpreting weather and climate graphs, and Question 6 to coastal processes.
Practise more with the map and graph reading practice. To go through your errors with a teacher, see online one-to-one Geography tuition.