I don't know if it'll be the same for your year as everywhere had a huge influx with the rising tuition fees, but for all of them there was about 170-200 in lectures, especially GEC as you have all ENV students (and there's 170 of us alone!) plus ecology, natural science, visiting international students etc. For labs/seminars because of the huge number they would run them twice, and have one half, one day and the other half another day, but the content will be the exact same.
For all of the modules there are two 1 hour lectures and a 3 hour lab/seminar.
GEC (Global Environmental Challenges) - probably my favourite module of the year, and lasts a whole semester. The main aim is to give you an overview of four challenges (Biodiversity&natural resources/climate change/natural hazards/energy&water) as well as the whole idea of env. sciences being interdisciplinary. Because of that you have a different lecturer each lecture who will talk about their outlook of each challenge i.e. a natural science/economic/political/social point of view. Involves an exam, a group presentation (which doesn't count to your final mark, just formative), and a 3000 word individual essay on a topic of your choice regarding one of the challenges.
Sustainability & Society - oh lord (*realised I have no idea how to describe this one*) starts of describing what sustainability/sustainable development is, looking at the politics/economics of it. Then moves on to how it has been used in different aspects of society (transport, retail etc.) and the challenges we face with applying sustainability. There is also a three hour seminar on bread... Even though it doesn't sound like it, I did find the lectures (well some) interesting.
Earths Chemical Processes - If you haven't done A level chemistry, the first 6 weeks are like a crash course in basic chemistry. What you learn in the lectures helps you to answer the worksheets you're given each week in the labs, which are to help you practice for the test. The test is in week 7 and it's similar to the worksheets (and is open book! thank god). Then for your coursework you go to Hunstanton beach (except when we went in Feb, it snowed haha), you collect rock samples to test in the labs and then answer some questions. If you have A level chem, you miss all of that and join those who haven't for the last 6 weeks of the module which is based on Environmental Chemistry (acid rain, photochemical smog, ocean acidification, hydrology, clay chemistry). Those who did A level Chem then have their own labs for the last 6 weeks, and I'm not sure what they did as I hadn't done A level chem.
Biodiversity - If you have done A level Biology the genetics section is a breeze, you do spend an awful lot of time in one lecture talking about abnormal sperm
As an ecology student this will be the one module you'll definitely be interested in haha. You cover things such as habitat fragmentation/destruction, effects of climate change on species/habitats, protection of habitats, extinction of species/overexploitation etc. For a lot of the labs you're out and about in the broad/woods sampling and there is a trip in week 12 to Strumpshaw Fen reserve.
The lecturers for all of those are all lovely, some of them are a tad bonkers. You'll see if you have the same polar bear lecture we had for GEC. I'm afraid I don't know how many ecology students there are, but i'd say there was at least 20? Which sounds small, but for the 1st year in ENV (except met&oceans/EGID) we don't have any optional modules, they're all core, so all 170+ of us are doing the same modules regardless of our course until yr 2. Like for Earth Sciences there are only 30 of us on the actual course.
Whoa essay.