Topic: India - social and economic contrasts

Target group

8th‑grade student of elementary school

Core curriculum

XIV. Selected problems and geographical regions of Asia. Asia as a continent of geographical contrasts;

4) shows the relationship between the features of the monsoon climate and the rhythm of crops and the „rice culture” in Southeast Asia.

8) determines the possibilities of economic development in India and presents the social contrasts in this country.

General aim of education

The student will characterize India as a country of contrasts.

Key competences

• communication in foreign languages;

• digital competence;

• learning to learn.

Criteria for success
The student will learn:

• Determine the geographical location of India;

• Discuss the most important characteristics of the natural environment of India;

• Explain the causes of uneven population distribution in India;

• Characterize agriculture in India;

• Examples of social contrasts in India.

Methods/techniques

• expository

  • talk.

• activating

  • discussion.

• exposing

  • exposition.

• programmed

  • with computer;

  • 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;

• physical map of Asia;

• geographical atlases;

• projector;

• statistical yearbooks;

• Google Earth.

Lesson plan overview

Before classes

• Students get acquainted with the content of the abstract. They prepare to work on the lesson in such a way to be able to summarize the material read in their own words and solve the tasks themselves.

Introduction

• The teacher launches the LearningApss application - a teaching game of Wisielec. Asks the question: Indicate the name of an Asian state whose civility is a society's characteristic. Students give letters and decipher that it is India.

• The teacher gives the topic of classes and informs students about the goals of the lesson.

• On the interactive whiteboard, launch the Google Earth application - find the location of India. Discussion.

• On the wall map of Asia, the student indicates India.

Realization

• On the interactive whiteboard, the teacher displays a hypsometric map of India. The students collectively determine the geographical location. They give the characteristics of the shoreline. They indicate the neighboring countries on the map.

• Students are developing the natural environment of India. Selected pairs discuss the class on the forum and indicate the environmental elements on the hypsometric map.

• The teacher gives the characteristics of the climate of India. Using the climate maps, the summer and winter monsoon is discussed.

• Students in the statistical yearbook search for the population in India. They explain the concept of a demographic explosion. They give reasons and effects..

• Together with the entire class team, analysis of the age structure of the population - e‑textbook.

• Work in pairs - religion in India and traditions resulting from it. Discussion on the forum.

• Work in four groups: Group I and II develops the economy of India: GDP, employment structure, mineral resources, industry. Group III and IV develops agriculture (use structure, cultivation, animal husbandry, mechanization of agriculture and the use of artificial fertilizers). Discussing the class of team representatives on the forum.

Summary

• At the summary of the lesson, students perform interactive exercises on the interactive whiteboard.

• The teacher evaluates students within one group drawn. It takes into account the contribution and their possibilities. It also evaluates the work of other students.

The following terms and recordings will be used during this lesson

Terms

Texts and recordings

India - social and economic contrasts

In India there are three main geographic areas:

• the Karakoram and the Himalayas at the northern border of the country;

• the Indo‑Gangetic Plain that includes the Ganga Plain, the Punjab Plain and also the Ganges‑Brahmaputra Delta (the majority of that area belongs of Pakistan);

• the Deccan Plateau on the Indian peninsula flanked by not too high mountains – the Eastern and the Western Ghats.

Apart from that, India has also two archipelagos: the Lakshadweep (the Laccadive Islands) on the Arabian Sea and Nicobar Islands on the Bay of Bengal.

Almost all of the Indian territory is under the influence of the tropical wet climate – the monsoon climate. There are two climate factors in that area which decide on the temperature and the rainfall variation over the year: the terrain of the region and the monsoon air circulation.

India is the country that currently has the highest absolute population growth. There has been over 100‑million‑people growth every decade since 1960. In the past five years (2010–2015) already 105 million people have been born.

This major population growth is due to the improvement of the quality of life in India since the mid‑20th century. The most important factors were:

• the increase in the accessibility of the medical services;

• better potable water supply;

• the increase in the food production since the Green Revolution.

Those were the reasons for the rise of the life expectancy and the decrease in the infant mortality. A big population growth that happened is called the population explosion.
In India the most numerous is the rural population. In 2005 a 67,3% of the society lived in the rural area. India is populated in a very unbalanced way. The highest average population density is in the agriculture lands. In the northern plain the population density comes to 400 people/kmIndeks górny 2² and in the Ganges Delta it is over 700 people/kmIndeks górny 2². There is also a high population density on the south‑western coast of the Indian peninsula and in the south of the country. On the Deccan Plateau, which is on the inside of the peninsula, the population density is lower and it amounts to 50--200 people/kmIndeks górny 2². The mountain areas and the Thar Desert are sparsely populated.
This big natural population growth makes the population of India young – we can see that from the shape of the population pyramid of the country. The most numerous group is the youth and the older the people, the bigger decease in number there is.

India is the country that is economically diverse and emerging. Half of the workers, a very high number, is still employed in the agricultural sector. In Poland, to compare, farmers make only 12% of the workers and in the highly developed countries they amount to only some percent. However, in India the service sector and the industry are developing quickly. The employment in those sectors gradually increases and their share of GDP is constantly growing. It means that India is developing and modern, because the big part of the GDP is generated by a still relatively small group of the population.

The agriculture is a vital sector of the economy for the Indian population of 1 billion people that simply needs to be fed. The 2/3 of the inhabitants lives in the rural areas of the country and most of them produce food. More than a half of the Indian territory is taken by the agricultural area, the vast majority of which is the arable land. The most space on the sown area take grains, that is: rice, wheat, millet, sorghum and corn. Those crops are the base of the alimentation in India, and they are being cultivated according to the natural environment factors.

The photo gallery below shows different looks of India.