GCSE-readyKS3 Geography: common mistakes
The wrong answers students pick most often in our Geography questions, and why they are wrong. Read these before a test, then open the lesson for anything that surprises you.
Maps and geographical skills
- Globes, atlases and finding places on Earth
- Not “How far east or west of Greenwich a place is”. That is longitude.
- Not “The Tropic of Capricorn”. Capricorn is about 23.5 degrees south.
- Compass directions, bearings and measuring distance
- Not “Measure straight from source to mouth with a ruler”. That gives straight-line distance, which is shorter than the real river.
- Showing height on maps, and reading aerial and satellite images
- Not “A photo looking straight down”. That is a vertical aerial photograph.
- Thematic maps and map projections
- Not “Lines of equal height”. Those are contour lines.
- Not “It shows directions wrongly”. Mercator was designed to keep directions true.
The UK and the world's biomes
- The UK: countries, cities and landscapes
- Not “Wales”. Wales is on the island of Great Britain.
- Not “Edinburgh”. Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland.
- Not “Belfast”. Belfast is the capital of Northern Ireland.
- World biomes and climate graphs
- Not “Monthly temperature”. Temperature is usually the line.
Plate tectonics, rocks and soils
- Plate boundaries, earthquakes and volcanoes
- Not “The point deep underground where it starts”. That is the focus.
- Living with tectonic hazards
- Not “A heavy concrete roof”. A heavy roof is more likely to collapse and crush people.
- Rocks and the rock cycle
- Not “Magma cooled slowly underground”. That would give large crystals, like granite.
Weather, population and cities
- Weather, climate and the UK
- Not “Today's weather”. That is weather.
- Not “The sun heating the ground”. That causes convectional rainfall.
- Not “Warm air rising over cold air at a front”. That is frontal rainfall.
- Fieldwork: investigating microclimates
- Not “Taking one reading in the morning and one in the afternoon”. Temperatures change through the day, so this would not be fair.
- Not “An anemometer”. An anemometer measures wind speed.
- Urbanisation: why cities grow
- Not “Better hospitals in the city”. That is a pull factor.
- Not “Jobs in factories”. That is a pull factor.
- Not “Electricity in the city”. That is a pull factor.
Rivers, coasts and glaciers
- The water cycle and drainage basins
- Not “Water vapour turning into clouds”. That is condensation.
- River processes, landforms and flooding
- Not “Stones scraping the river bed”. That is abrasion.
- Managing river floods
- Not “Planting trees”. That is soft engineering.
- Managing coasts: Holderness and beyond
- Not “It is made of very hard granite”. Hard rock erodes slowly.
- Glaciers and glacial landscapes
- Not “Rocks in the ice scraping the ground”. That is abrasion.
Climate change and extreme environments
- Climate change from the Ice Age to today
- Not “Burning coal in power stations”. That is a human cause.
- Not “Cutting down rainforests”. That is a human cause.
- Not “Driving petrol cars”. That is a human cause.
- Tropical storms
- Not “A hurricane”. Hurricane is used in the Atlantic and north-east Pacific.
- Not “A tornado”. A tornado is a much smaller, different kind of storm.
- Not “The windiest and wettest part”. That describes the eye wall.
- Hot deserts and polar regions
- Not “The Sahara”. The Sahara is the largest HOT desert.
- Not “An ice-covered continent”. That describes Antarctica.
Economy, development and resources
- Energy: powering the UK
- Not “It releases large amounts of carbon dioxide”. Nuclear power produces very little carbon dioxide.
Migration and globalisation
- Migration: why people move
- Not “Someone who leaves a country”. That is an emigrant.
- Not “A person who moves for a better-paid job”. That is voluntary economic migration.
Africa, Asia, Russia and the Middle East
- Africa: countries, regions and cities
- Not “Algeria”. Algeria is the largest by area.
- Not “Mount Everest”. Everest is in Asia.
- Asia: China and India
- Not “Shanghai”. Shanghai is China's largest city, but not its capital.
- Not “The Nile”. The Nile is in Africa.
- Russia and the Middle East
- Not “A frozen treeless plain”. That is the tundra.
- The Middle East up close: the United Arab Emirates
- Not “Dubai”. Dubai is the best-known city, but not the capital.
- Not “Riyadh”. Riyadh is the capital of Saudi Arabia.
Comparing Kenya and Mumbai
- A region in Africa: Kenya
- Not “Mombasa”. Mombasa is Kenya's main port, not its capital.
- A region in Asia: Mumbai, India
- Not “It is India's capital city”. New Delhi is India's capital.
People, environments and fieldwork
- People and environments: the Amazon rainforest
- Not “The Congo”. The Congo is the second largest.
- How people rely on natural systems
- Not “Combustion”. Combustion releases carbon dioxide.
- Oceans: the blue planet
- Not “The Arctic”. The Arctic is the smallest ocean.
- Not “Where plates move apart”. That forms mid-ocean ridges.
- Not “About 1%”. Under 1% is the share of the ocean floor they cover.
Sustainable futures
- Responding to climate change: mitigation and adaptation
- Not “Coping with floods and droughts”. That is adaptation.
- Not “Switching from coal to wind power”. That cuts emissions, so it is mitigation.
- Feeding the world: food security
- Not “Fish farming”. That is aquaculture.
- Changing UK cities: regeneration and sustainability
- Not “Farmland that has never been built on”. That is greenfield.
- Not “People moving into city centres”. That is re-urbanisation.