Human Fieldwork - London Docklands - Edexcel Geography GCSE

What is the first stage of the enquiry process?

Asking questions about the area

What is our overall Enquiry Question?

How has the London Docklands area changed from 1960 to present?

What are our 3 sub-questions?

1) How has the urban environmental quality changed?

2) How has demographics of the area changed?

3) How has land use changed?

How do we decide our enquiry questions?

Based on practicality and relevance to area (e.g. measuring the effects of glaciation here is not relevant nor practical)

What is the second stage of the enquiry process?

Carrying out research (primary and secondary)

How have you found primary data? (Name 7)

Soundscape, EPQ, RICEPOTS transect, Pedestrian count, field sketch, photos, Questionnaires

What is a soundscape?

The sounds that we can hear in the area in a set time (1 min)

Disadvantages of soundscape:

May not be representative of area as sounds may vary depending on time of day

Advantages of soundscape:

Can find aspects of the area that we may not be able to see (e.g. birds, shops, activity in area)

What is an EQS?

Environmental Quality Survey (quantitative assessment of environment)

Disadvantages of an EQS:

Subjective data - one person's view can be very different to another's

Advantages of an EQS:

Easy to do and easier to spot trends (quantitative data is easier to follow and assess)

What is RICEPOTS ?

Where land use is tallied on either side of a set length in the area (Residential, Industrial, Commercial, Entertainment, Public building, Open space, Transport, Services)

Disadvantages to RICEPOTS:

May not be representative and biased - choosing area to measure because it looks nicer, etc.

Advantages to RICEPOTS:

Quantitative so easy to follow trends

What is pedestrian count?

Counting the amount of people who cross an imaginary line in a set time frame

Advantages to Pedestrian Count:

Easy to see if area is very busy

Disadvantages to Pedestrian Count:

Only measures one aspect of the area and can be hard/long to carry out

What is a field sketch?

An annotated drawing of the area featuring the key details (usually done while being in place)

Disadvantages to field sketch:

May miss out key details and may provide a flawed/biased view of area

Advantages of field sketch:

Simplified view of area so viewers are not distracted by unnecessary details

What are photos?

Pictures taken of the area (annotated)

Disadvantages of photos:

Details may distract viewers and can be biased (may miss stuff out still)

Advantages of photos:

Can be taken immediately, accurately represents the geographical location

What are questionnaires?

A set of written questions that are used to gauge local people's opinions

Disadvantages of questionnaires:

People may answer wrongly, questions may miss out key details, bias of people in area (demographically/ time spent in area, etc.)

Advantages of questionnaires:

Quick and easy, qualitative data, can see more about what place is like

What methods of secondary data have you used?

Census, magazines, newspapers

Advantages of secondary data:

Can find more about inaccessible data (e.g. what Docklands was like in 1960s) and may be more reliable (e.g. census)

Disadvantages of secondary data:

May be inaccurate, not specific to enquiry, harder to check reliability

What is the 3rd stage of the enquiry process?

Data Presentation

What is the difference between simple and sophisticated data presentation?

Simple - shows only one type/section of data

Sophisticated - shows more than one type of data

What is the 4th stage of the enquiry process?

Analysis and explanation of data

What is the 5th stage of the enquiry process?

Drawing conclusions and summaries

What were our conclusions?

1) Land use has changed to more commercial land use from industrial

2) Environmental Quality has improved for the better (more spacious and greener)

3) Demographics of area have changed (more diverse and amount of people)

What is the 6th stage of the enquiry process?

Reflection and evaluation of fieldwork

What are the 4 types of sampling?

Random, systematic, stratified, opportunistic

What is Random sampling?

Samples chosen randomly so everything has an equal chance of being chosen

Disadvantages of random sampling:

Can lead to poor representation of area

Advantages of random sampling:

Avoids bias, easy to do/organise

What is Systematic Sampling?

Sample are chosen in a regular pattern

Disadvantages of systematic sampling:

More biased as not everything has an even chance of being chosen - over representation

Advantages of systematic sampling:

Good coverage of population, evenly distributed in any context (spatial or temporal)

What is stratified sampling?

Samples chosen out of subgroups

Disadvantages of stratified sampling:

Hard to work out accurate proportions

Advantages of stratified sampling:

Very representative, can be used with random or systematic sampling

What is opportunistic sampling?

Sampling done to be the most accurate as possible

Disadvantages of opportunistic sampling:

Not representative, can be biased

Advantages of opportunistic sampling:

Quick, easy and safe

What was the Docklands used for in 1960s?

Trade for ships and merchant vessels on the Thames

Why did the Docklands lose competitivity?

Ships were too big and the place was behind in technology

When did the London Docklands close?

1981

What effect did the closure of the Docklands have?

High unemployment, decline in environmental quality

What happened during the 1980s?

Under the LDDC (London Docklands Development Corporation), incentives were made to attract more businesses, with transport as well (Docklands Light Railway)

What happened during the 1990s

Rapid development of One Canada Square and an extension of the Jubilee Line. First tenants moved in in 1999 (now home to lots of banks and companies)

What is happening now?

There are 90,000 people working in the area, covering 93 acres in size, 14.1 million square feet of office and retail space