Topic: Types of river outlets

Target group

First‑grade student of high school or technical school

Core curriculum

General requirements

II. Skills and application of knowledge in practice.

3. Identifying relations between particular elements of the geographical environment (natural, socio‑economic and cultural).

Specific requirements

V. Litosphere: relationship between the interior structure of the Earth and the tectonics of lithosphere plates, internal and external processes shaping the Earth's surface and their effects, rocks.

Student:

3) characterizes the main external processes modeling the Earth's surface (erosion, transport, accumulation) and effects of the sculptural activity of rivers, wind, glaciers, glacier and seas, and weathering.

General aim of education

Explaining to students differences between the main types of river outlets.

Key competences

• communication in foreign languages;

• digital competence;

• learning to learn.

Criteria for success

• to explain what a river delta is, and in what conditions it is created;

• to explain what an estuary is, and in what conditions it is created;

• to determine the type of a river outlet based on a map or satellite image.

Methods/techniques

• expository

  • talk.

• activating

  • discussion;

  • brainstorming.

• programmed

  • with e‑textbook.

• practical

  • exercices concerned.

Forms of work

• individual activity;

• activity in pairs;

• activity in groups;

• collective activity.

Teaching aids

• e‑textbook;

• interactive whiteboard, tablets/computers.

Lesson plan overview

Before classes

• Before classes, the instructor recommends students to read at home with all the material from the lesson „Types of river outlets” in the e‑textbook..

Introduction

• The teacher gives the topic, the goals of the lesson in a language understandable for the student, and the criteria of success.

Realization

• The teacher indicates a student who briefly characterizes river mouth types and explains what conditions should be met to create one of these types (delta or estuary)..

• The teacher presents maps of river estuaries of the Vistula and Odra rivers. Working with the brainstorming method, the class determines their type and lists the factors affecting the nature of these mouths. If there are students in the class who visited the area of the mouth of the Vistula or the Oder, the teacher asks them for a brief description of the relief of the site. The lecturer summarizes this part of the lesson shortly.

• The teacher divides the class into groups. Each group draws the name of the river from the previously prepared pool. Then it determines on which continent the river is drawn and to what sea or ocean it is escaping. With the help of the Google Earth application, students find a satellite map of the estuary and based on the picture determine the outlet type (delta, estuary or indirect form).

• Each group presents a photo of the river estuary to the class (displaying it on a multimedia board or on a computer monitor) and then explains on what basis it has classified the outlet to a specific type. The other students can ask the group presenting questions, submit their comments and doubts. After each presentation, the teacher gives students feedback, responds to the answer and explains in the event of an incorrect answer, what was the error in reasoning.

Summary

• The teacher asks students to carry out the recommended interactive exercise themselves.

Homework

• Listen to the abstract recording at home. Pay attention to pronunciation, accent and intonation. Learn to pronounce the words learned during the lesson.

The following terms and recordings will be used during this lesson

Terms

Texts and recordings

Types of river outlets

A river may flow into another one, thus becoming its tributary. The transported rock material is then taken over by the main river. When the outlet is on the shore of a sea or lake, the river at that places loses its ability to transport sediments, and all material accumulates. When the sea (or lake) is shallow in that place, and there are no strong coastal currents or high tides, the rock material brought by the river is accumulated on the shore of the reservoir and gradually backfills the outlet, forming an alluvial fan called a delta.

In some places, rivers flow into a deep, open sea. In addition, strong sea currents and high tides often occur in such places. The sediments brought by the river are carried out to sea and deposited in the depths far from the shore. The outlet of the river does not become backfilled, and the riverbed expands not due to river erosion, but due to repeated falling tides and rising tides that sometimes reach far upstream. Rising and falling tides are erosive and widen the outlet, at the same time preventing accumulation of the material carried by the river. Because of their shape, in Poland they have been called funnel outlets, and in the rest of the world – estuaries from the Latin term aestuarium which originally meant ‘seaway’. In many cases, river outlets have a form that is intermediate between a delta and an estuary.