Edexcel Unit 2: Geographical Investigations

Are introductions and conclusions completely necessary? I've been looking at the examiner's reports and top level answers often don't seem to have them. Just wondering what everyone else has been told regards exam technique..

How is everyone coping for time.. if I stick to the 1 mark = 1 minute idea then I write a load of rubbish and its awful, yet if I write to what I feel confident with then I dont have enough time to finish the second question D:

Also, I get really bad hand cramps for this exam! Its going to be absolutely hideous :'(

How are you lot preparing for the hand pain lol ?

That seems about right But what do you actually do with your points? Do you briefly describe how to carry out the technique and what its for? How much would you recommend writing for each technique?

Can somebody explain to me the methods behind carrying out a:
Environmental Quality Assessment
Land Use Survey
Index of Decay

^ how did you guys do these?

EQS is a criteria based technique used to evaluate the local area with several categories that relate to the inequality or whatever you are investigating. Each category is usually ranked from about -5 to +5 to show a range from very bad to very good. The categories can be totalled up and compared with results taken from other areas.

Land use survey is having a GOAD map of the area and recording what every building is in the map's range. So you would say the building is a souvenir shop and maybe record the building's age or something and then repeat for all the buildings in the area. Can be compared to past land use surveys to see how the local area has changed over time.

Index of decay usuallly based on opinionated categories like EQS and a total is taken and put on a scale comparing different places. Can't remember this one in a lot of detail though.

These are my thoughts maybe someone else can add to them hope it helps

Dumb question, but what IS goad mapping? I didn't go on the trip (too expensive) so I'm confused by some of the terms the mark schemes use..

Hi yh now that you think about it, the other questions have come up loads.

I think that for extreme weather, they are probably going to come up with something to do with changing weather conditions as that has only come up once too.

Dumb question, but what IS goad mapping? I didn't go on the trip (too expensive) so I'm confused by some of the terms the mark schemes use..

We haven't done any fieldwork, so I am struggling to understand terms too. How will you write in the exam about your fieldwork? will you write 'we could have done' or 'we have done' and provide examples? Do you have all the data and the results of the fieldwork? I have nothing and the teacher doesn't care at all, he told us to 'invent' the data and I have no clue how to do it so it looks credible

Do we need to know an urban and rural case study for the key players in rebranding? I've got one for the Olympics, but that's it

Ah I feel your pain, the people in my class who didn't go (including me) have asked the teachers for a catch up type of session and they can't as they're too 'busy' -.- Did your class not do the fieldwork stuff at all? I have the booklets and stuff they wrote on but it makes no sense to me at all, so I just plan to make up my own data but I'll actually use the places my class went to so it sounds believable :s But if its 'evaluate your methods' or 'how would you present your data' types of questions I'm screwed. What about you?

Yes, does anyone have any good case study places for rebranding? I know there is Cornwall for rural and Stratford for Urban, but I need more range and variety

Do we need to know an urban and rural case study for the key players in rebranding? I've got one for the Olympics, but that's it

he only gave us the methods that we can use in order to investigate the flood risk (maps, how to measure the flood likelihood, severity, etc) and assess the impacts of rebranding, but he gave us no data at all. I mean I plan to write that we did surveys, used photographs, ect but I am not sure what to write in the conclusion. You are lucky that you actually have the booklet and at least can study from it, I only have methods, so I'm screwed

By the way, did you study all of the case studies?

Objective 1 for Cornwall, that's the only other one i have
but if it asks for examples of key players, i think you can write different players (there's about 8 for London Olympics) instead of a key player from examples of different places

Ah well make up your own! Better than nothing. But hopefully the question will be 'what fieldwork and research will you UNDERTAKE' as opposed to 'what fieldwork and research have you UNDERTOOK' The booklet barely contained useful data (But I've only skimmed through it) so it's not much help..but good luck!