Topic: Modern Europe's population and cultural diversity

Author: Magdalena Jankun

Target group

8th‑grade students of elementary school.

Core curriculum (basic range)

VII. Geography of Europe: population diversity and ageing of societies.

Student:

7) explains the causes and consequences of the demographic diversity of the European population.

The general aim of education

You will discuss the diversity of the European population.

Criteria of success

• You will discuss the cultural diversity of the European population;

• indicate single- and multi‑national countries on the map;

• list the main language groups in Europe and indicate their coverage on the map;

• analyse statistical data presented on population diagrams;

• discuss what religions dominate on the European continent.

Key competences

• communication in the mother tongue;

• communication in a foreign language;

• learning to learn;

• digital competence.

Methods / techniques

• using ICT tools;

• activity with educational material and multimedia on the e‑textbook platform;

• using the Google Earth programme;

• individual activity, activity in pairs, and collective activity.

Teaching aids

• e‑textbook for teaching geography;

• interactive whiteboard;

• multimedia projector;

• tablets/computers;

• physical map of Europe;

• geographical atlases.

Lesson plan overview

Before classes

1. The teacher presents lesson goals and criteria of success.

2. The teacher begins the classes with an interactive exercise for the students: solve the crossword. The students approach the interactive whiteboard one by one and fill in the appropriate boxes. The password of the crossword is „diversity”. The teacher explains the meaning of the password in the context of the European population.

Realization

1. Work in pairs. Task for the students: using the table entitled „Changes in the population of Europe in the years 1960‑2013” and the scheme entitled „Population of Europe in comparison with the population of the world”, as well as other source materials, complete the tasks:

• analyse the rate of population change over the years from 1960 to 2013;

• find the information on the current European population;

• give the reasons for changes in the population of Europe;

• draw conclusions on the forecast of the population of Europe for the year 2030.

The selected pairs present their conclusions on the class forum.

2.Work in groups. Based on the contents of the e‑textbook, other source materials and information in geographical atlases, the students characterize language groups and religions that dominate in Europe. They indicate examples on the map.

1st group: Romance languages

2nd group: Germanic languages

3rd group: Slavic languages

4th group: Baltic languages

5th group: Finno‑Ugric languages

6th group: the structure of the faithful in Europe and examples of countries

Each group discusses the task on the class forum. It indicates examples on the wall map of Europe.

3.Work with text. Explanation of terms and giving examples: single‑nation country, multi‑national country, ethnic minorities.

4.Doing interactive exercises included in the abstract.

5.The students perform the task: Using different sources, give examples of countries of the world where the official languages are languages from Europe: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Dutch.

Summary

1. As a summary of the lesson, the teacher asks the students to complete the text (interactive exercise).

2. Summary of classes and assessment of the students' work.

The following terms and recordings will be used during this lesson

Terms

Texts and recordings

Modern Europe's population and cultural diversity.

European civilization is a kind of historical „whole” connecting us Europeans with the continent we live on. The elements of the culture of ancient Greece and the Roman Empire as well as Christianity are considered the basis of our civilization. In spite of these common deep‑rooted traditions, today's Europe is diverse, and also the importance of its place in the modern world is changing.

There are currently 742 million people in Europe, which is 10.4% of the total world population (data from 2013). The population living in 46 independent countries of this continent is ethnically, linguistically, and religiously diverse, and different in terms of the structure of gender and age. This is due to the various, sometimes dramatic, social and economic processes that shaped our continent in the past.
The overwhelming majority of Europe's population belongs to the white race. Small groups of the yellow race have lived near the Volga River – the Kalmyks, on the Crimea – the Tatars, and in Lapland in the North of the Scandinavian Peninsula – the Laplanders.

On a relatively small continent like Europe, there are around 100 nations today. The term nation defines a community of people having a common historical and cultural past, speaking the same language and living in the same territory. If other separate national groups are distinguished in the country inhabited by one nation, they are defined as a national minority or an ethnic minority.

Historically multinational nations in Europe are:

• Belgium, where the Flemish people live in the northern part of the country, using the Flemish language (Dutch – the official language in the Netherlands), and in the southern part there are people of Wallonia using the French (Walloon) language;

• Great Britain in which the English, the Scots, the Irish and the Welsh live; the official language is English, but minority languages have been preserved: Welsh, Scottish (Gaelic).

In some countries, apart from the local population, there is a large group of immigrant populations, and then these countries should also be considered multinational. These include: Estonia, Latvia, Luxembourg, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland.
A particular example of a multinational state is the Russian Federation: the dominant group is the Russians, but apart from them there are several separate national groups, as well as dozens of ethnic groups.

The countries in which there is only one nation are countries of high ethnic cohesion. In Europe, these include: Portugal, Greece, Poland, Norway, Albania. Ethnic groups with separate languages and cultures live in many European, one‑nation countries, but they are not very numerous.
One of the processes that took place in Europe in the last few decades is migration movement, i.e. the movement of people between countries to change their place of residence. Most countries in Europe have a positive balance of migration, which means that immigration (arrivals of population) is higher than emigration (departures of population). In 2013, the highest positive balance of migration was recorded in Germany (433,000), Great Britain (209,000), and Italy (182,000). People from Central and Eastern Europe, as well as from Africa, Asia and South America migrate to those countries.

The population of Europe uses languages belonging to three language families: Indo‑European, Ural and Altai. The Indo‑European language family gave origin to three language groups: Romance, Germanic and Slavic having the largest range in Europe. Languages from the other two families have a smaller range. An isolated language, which is not related to others, is Basque used by a population group living in the western part of the Pyrenees. The Basques are considered to be the only indigenous non‑Indo‑European population in Europe.

European languages in the written form use three alphabets:  Greek, Latin and Cyrillic.

The following infographic provides information on the most frequently taught foreign languages in Europe.

An important social element that influences the lives of people to a greater or lesser extent is the status of belonging to a given religious group. In Europe, the most numerous group is Christians. Historical divisions led to the creation of large sections of this religion. Today, in certain regions or states, there are larger or smaller groups of followers of one of the sections of Christianity.