KE5033 - Environmental Cycles: Air, Water, Soil

In this module, you will learn through lectures, fieldwork activities, laboratory practical classes and IT workshops. In addition to timetabled sessions, your independent study will be guided and supported through your engagement with a range of interactive learning resources accessible on-line via the module eLP site, including electronic reading lists.

Lectures will be used to introduce and develop key issues, concepts and principles across the range of topics covered on the module, thus acting as a framework to support your learning. You will develop your practical and technical skills in environmental monitoring and sampling through participation in field visits, enabling you to explore the links between theory and practice. These skills will be further developed through involvement in laboratory practical classes and IT workshops, where you will also get an opportunity to analyse and interpret environmental data and to develop your technical report writing skills. Many of the practical activities will enable you to develop your ability to work effectively as part of a group or team, which is very important in relation to future employability.

During field visits, laboratory practical classes and IT workshops, you will engage in small group activities during which you will benefit from peer interaction and support. In these sessions, you will also interact closely with teaching staff who will provide formative support and feedback on activities leading up to the assessment tasks. For the group project assessment, for example, you will have the opportunity to submit an early draft of the report for formative feedback prior to the final submission, thus enabling you to achieve your full potential in this assessment task.

Your class materials will be further supported by on-line resources available via the module eLP site. These resources include an interactive reading list with on-line access to a number of key articles and aligned with your weekly lecture programme. Staff teaching on the module have an open door policy during normal working hours and are responsive to communication via e-mail to support your learning.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. The reading list for this module can be found at: http://readinglists.northumbria.ac.uk


(Reading List service online guide for academic staff, this contains contact details for the Reading List team – http://library.northumbria.ac.uk/readinglists)

Knowledge & Understanding:
• MLO 1: Discuss the key constituents and properties of soil, water and air, and relate these to the processes occurring within them and the wider environmental controls influencing their behaviour.
• MLO 2: Review the dynamic nature of pollution and the impacts of a broad range of pollutants on environmental systems and human health.
• MLO 3: Outline the considerations and approaches used in the management and mitigation of soil, air and water pollution.

Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:
• MLO 4: Select and apply appropriate analytical techniques and methodologies in field and laboratory settings and in relation to data collection, processing, modelling and presentation.

Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):
• MLO 5: Work effectively as part of a group or team towards the effective production of a project report.
• MLO 6: Demonstrate effective oral and visual presentation skills.

The summative assessment tasks for this module are: a group report (3000 words, 50% weighting), and an individual poster presentation (50% weighting).

The assessments will enable you to integrate theoretical and practical aspects of environmental science. This report will test MLOs 1 – 4 in the context of an environmental field study and address MLO 5. The poster presentation will test MLOs 1 – 4 in the context of spatial and temporal trends in environmental quality, regulatory frameworks to address them, and mitigation measures that could be adopted to improve them. The poster will also address MLO 6.

Formative assessment will be provided through submission of a draft version of the group report and by monitoring and discussing student engagement during interactive practical classes. A small proportion of marks within the group report will be reserved for assessment of individual engagement with the project and will be determined through monitoring of participation in the field visit and at laboratory practical sessions.

For both assessments, written feedback, together with the mark awarded, will enable students to feed forward key aspects into assessments in other modules at both levels 5 and 6. The practical and project/enquiry-based nature of the assessments will also support students in thinking ahead towards their final year dissertation.

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This module focuses on soil, air and water, the key processes operating within them and the wider environmental cycles influencing their characteristics and behaviour. It explores the dynamic nature of pollution, the regulatory framework in which it is managed, its impacts on environmental systems and human health, and approaches to management and mitigation. You will gain understanding of the key processes that cycle both the essential ingredients for life and potentially harmful pollutants between air, water, and soil. You will develop skills in a range of field and laboratory techniques and approaches to data collection and analysis used in environmental monitoring. Teaching will involve lectures to introduce and develop key ideas and issues together with more interactive, smaller group activities during field visits, laboratory practical classes and IT workshops where you will be able to analyse and interpret environmental data. Your learning will be further enhanced through engagement with a range of interactive online resources available via the module eLP site. Assessment will involve a group report focusing on environmental fieldwork and sample analysis and an individual poster presentation focusing on temporal and spatial trends environmental quality and the regulatory and mitigation framework to address them. You will receive formative support and guidance throughout the assessment process enabling you to achieve your full potential.