AQA GCE Geography Unit 3- 7th June 2013

Look at page 16 (3.6) of the specification. Is something I've heard a lot over the years.

My handwriting was terrible, looked like a pen-war bomb site.

Roughly how much do you guys think i would get in the tectonics essay?..
i wrote about: physical factors (type of plate boundary, type of volcano, type of eruption and type of lava) and non-physical (location of volcano i.e. densely or sparsely populated area, prediction, preparation and planning, MEDCs and LEDCs) also included around 4/5 examples/case studies).

thank you in advance..just stressed because i ran out of time so i didn't finish the 8 and 10 markers on world cities

I have to ask, the essay question for ecosystems was something along the lines of 'discuss the importance of human factors on ecosystems on a local scale'. Firstly I talked about all the urban ecosystems, oxford ragwort etc. but, in a moment of panic, with 30 minutes to go, I thought I was discussing the wrong content, got really depressed and so my final 2 case studies are so bad they may aswell not be in the essay. How badly will this effect my mark?

I'm not an examiner or anything and I didn't do the ecosystems essay, but they have to mark positively, so they don't mark you down for anything that's wrong, which should mean that even if the last two case studies didn't get any marks, they won't loose any either, so all they did was waste time at the worst. And there's probably something mark-worthy in them, so I don't think it's worth worrying about

Essentially, I picked the 40 marker on ecosystems in a moment of madness. At the beginning of the exam I thought it was the best one for me to answer, but when it came to actually writing it, I started to panic because I was unsure whether I understood the question and had enough to write about (which I didn't).
The 40 marker was somewhere along the lines of;

'Discuss how human influence can impact an ecosystem on a local scale.'

I wrote about:
- Pollution and its effects of the local biodiversity leading to the abundance of Lecandora Lichen
- The introduction of Spanish bluebells which are narrowing the biodiversity by out competing and mixing with our native species
- Agriculture leading to the destruction of our native temperate deciduous woodland and the reduction of biodiversity
- Heather Moorland replacing the deforested native woodlands
- How a dam would change areas up stream into a hydrosere ( I was clutching at straws)
- Mowing lawns etc

I threw in loads of references to plagioclimax etc to try fill it up, but I panicked and had a complete mind blank.
I am majorly freaking out and have been incredibly stressed since the exam. Can you put me out of my misery and say whether I was along the right lines or not?
I am 56 UMS away from my entry grade for university and I think this exam will have ruined my chances..

I'm in exactly the same situation as you, and wrote the exact same content since I thought "local scale" was referring to the UK. I take it you did the Liverpool Merseyside forest & Yorkshire moor studies?

I also wrote about the impacts of roads and railways on ecosystems- wildlife corridors, waterplants from drainage on the train tracks etc. I'm so scared.

I'm in exactly the same situation as you, and wrote the exact same content since I thought "local scale" was referring to the UK. I take it you did the Liverpool Merseyside forest & Yorkshire moor studies?

I also wrote about the impacts of roads and railways on ecosystems- wildlife corridors, waterplants from drainage on the train tracks etc. I'm so scared.

For the tectonics essay you could have mentioned:

Human factors - Distance to population, capacity to cope (ability to manage), amount of defences / prediction / preparation (ISN'T a factor between LEDCS/MEDCS)

Physical Factors - VEI Eruption scale, type of hazards (pyroclastic flows), the time of day it occured, the season it occured (snow melt causes Lahars, and response is ALWAYS better in summer (with the heat)), amount of warning signs, geography of the land, (did the flows channel themselves into the town?), evacuation routes, iceland sea example would be nice here..

Include as many case studies as possible, and made a opinion of whether human / physical are more important when it comes to the impact, (physical obviously). Human capacity to cope and preparation can never truly be the deciding factor when it comes to impacts, the physical factors are far more important.

Something along those lines would get you 30+

Great. I didn't write anything about physical factors at all... ooops. What do you mean by "isn't a factor"

me neither i just wrote about the development of the area, the timing, the population and then about the preparation

Also anyone who did the structured questions for conflict, what did you put for outline the causes of poverty and evaluate how poverty is being globally addressed? That was genuinely the only section of conflict that I didn't revise in detail.


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I'm not an examiner or anything and I didn't do the ecosystems essay, but they have to mark positively, so they don't mark you down for anything that's wrong, which should mean that even if the last two case studies didn't get any marks, they won't loose any either, so all they did was waste time at the worst. And there's probably something mark-worthy in them, so I don't think it's worth worrying about

hey sorry i have a quick question - the globalisation question was to do with LDCs and how they can't cope with problems on their own (command word was 'dicuss') - i talked about Aid but apprently you were supposed to talking about both trade and aid - what mark will this limit me to? (i included some out of spec. knowledge in case that helps). Thank you