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33 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
- 3rd side (hint)
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What do people who study geography learn about?
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They study the earth and its relationship to the people who live on it.
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You are standing on this place right now.
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What is topography?
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The study of the Earth's land and water features.
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The shapes, the valleys and mountains and water bodies and . . .
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What is a hemisphere?
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Half of a sphere.
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In the case of the Earth, you can split in into W/E hemi- spheres (by the Prime Meridian) or N/S hemi- spheres (by the Equator)
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Name two examples of natural resources.
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Oil, coal, natural gas, water, timber, minerals, etc.
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"the wealth of nature"
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What is rural?
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Having to do with the countryside.
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The opposite of URBAN. In developing countries, most rural people do subsistence farming for a living.
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What is urban?
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Having to do with the city; urbanization is the tendency of people to move to major cities for better jobs, infrastructure (plumbing, electricity, etc).
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You live outside of Syracuse in the suburb of Liverpool.
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What is urbanization?
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The tendency of people to move to cities in search of better jobs, living facilities etc.
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This is a worldwide tendency, in both developed and developing nations as people seek opportunities.
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What is a subcontinent?
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a large area of land geographically separated from the rest of the continent (such as India from Asia).
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India is separated by the Himalayas to the NE and the Hindu Kush mountains to the NW
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What are monsoons?
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Seasonal WINDS that change direction in South and Southeast Asia.
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The summer monsoon comes off the Indian ocean and brings rain for agriculture in South and Southeast Asia. The winter monsoon comes off Central Asia and brings dry air.
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What is a plateau?
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A raised relatively flat area of land.
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The plateau of Tibet in Southwest China is at a very high elevation.
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What does elevation tell you?
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It tells you how high a place on the Earth is (how many feet or meters above sea level).
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Altitude tells you how high in the air you are. This tells you height on land.
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What does arid mean?
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dry, as in a desert
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You hope your Arid Antiperspirant will keep you this way!
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What is a natural barrier?
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Any physical feature or land or water form that helps to isolate a nation or a region.
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A physical boundary that is hard to cross.
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What are political boundaries?
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Man-made borders decided by governments.
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These limit where a nation's territory begins and ends.
(US history - 54 degrees, 40 minutes) |
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What is a regular or smooth coastline?
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One that has few bays or harbors or ports - it is difficult to ship without these things.
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Africa's coastline was smooth, making it difficult to land ships or explore the continent itself.
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What are the advantages of an IRREGULAR (also called rough) coastline?
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An irregular coastline has many bays, ports and harbors so shipping and protection of the ships is possible.
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Irregular Coasts are "longer" because of all the nooks and crannies.
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What is the topographical land feature called a plain or plains?
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An area of land that is level and at a lower elevation than a plateau.
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The Great Plains
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What continent is a peninsula of peninsulas with a very rough or irregular coastline?
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Europe
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This tiny continent was dominant in the Age of Exploration and the Naval Age. It's many ports and harbors helped it. It is small but has many languages, resources, etc. Many developed nations.
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What is climate?
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The weather conditions of a region over a long long period of time
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Long term weather
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What is the savannah climate zone/region of Africa?
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It is the grasslands dotted with scattered trees. It has unreliable rainfall yet is where many Africans live and farm.
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40 % of Africa has this climate zone. Think Animal Planet. Think that dry season with brown grasses and the occasional baobab or umbrella tree, with giraffes, zebras, lions, etc. underneath.
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What are the STEPPES of Central Asia or South/Southeastern Russia?
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STEPPE is a vast area of land usually relatively level (sometimes slightly hilly) and often treeless and grassy.
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The Silk Road often went through the steppes.
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What is the definition of "arable"?
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land that is fertile or good for farming
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(a as in arable
a as in agriculture) |
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What is a peninsula?
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It is a land feature. It is a piece of land that juts out surrounded by water on THREE (repeat THREE) sides.
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FLORIDA or the ARABIAN peninsula (Saudi Arabia).
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What is a continent?
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one of the world's seven landmasses.
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Africa is one of these, not a country.
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What is an isthmus?
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It is a LAND feature. It is a NARROW STRIP OF LAND that CONNECTS two LARGER PIECES OF LAND.
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The famous example (before we dug the canal) was the Isthmus of Panama, which connected North and South America.
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What is an archipelago?
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a chain of islands
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Examples are Japan, Hawaii, the Philippines, Indonesia, etc.
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What are relative location measurements on a map or globe?
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North, South, East, West, etc. of something.
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Never Eat Slimy Worms.
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Why were river valleys such as the Indus, the Yellow, the Nile, the Tigris and Euphrates (Mesopotamia) the location of humanity's earliest civilizations and cities?
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These were areas with warm climates and fertile (arable) soil. In spring, floods would deposit silt on the river banks and people began a neolithic (agricultural) revolution by settling and farming there.
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Eventually surplus food let to the growth of cities and specialization.
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What is a strait?
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It is a WATER BODY. It is a narrow strip of WATER that connects two larger water bodies.
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To go from the Mediterranean Sea to the Black Sea, you have to go through the Straits of Dardanelles and the Bosphorus Strait. Straits are strategically important because you can bottleneck and control shipping.
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When a nation is landlocked, what problem does it have?
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It has no access to the sea (no border on an ocean or sea).
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When I taught in Hungary, I could not buy myself a Soviet Nuclear Submarine and drive it Home to America because of this! (well, also, I didn't have enough $$$)
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What continent is 40% savannah and 30% desert, wth many natural features that isolate or limit communication and easy travel?
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Africa
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What feature covers the western half of China?
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Mountains.
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South America has two major natural features that isolate and distinguish it.
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The Andes Mountains and the Amazon River drainage Basin.
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