A few connections...

First of all, today had a meeting with our Chinese visitors from Qinghua Middle School in Chongqing. We've been showing a DVD of aerial views over the city which was presented to us by David and Mr. Yin, which shows it to be an incredible city. I showed the visitors Google Earth (of course), and we flew from Beijing and Tiananmen Square to Chongqing and managed to locate the school. We talked about the ideas of exchanging information between the schools, and will look to doing a project involving a new computer based 'chat room' and Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) called UNISERVITY.
I also tried my best to get a trip out there, to see the 3 Gorges.
We also talked about how China has one time zone, so that whatever the time is in Beijing, it is the same time in the whole of China, despite the huge size of the country.
We also talked about KARST scenery, which is the scenery produced when areas of limestone are eroded at different rates. The famous GUILIN pinnacles are a short flight away from the city.

I also had a virtual communication with Sarah from PICKLE MY FANCY. She is following the 100 Mile Diet idea which I mentioned in an earlier post. The idea is that you can only eat food produced within 100 miles of where you live. Sarah got in touch to tell me about her blog, which makes very interesting reading. There are some obvious links with the local area.
One of them is this product below. Do you recognise it ?
I'll post more about this product and its local links at the weekend.
How do you know how far away a place is from your house ? Well Sarah also mentions on the blog a very useful tool called the UK POSTCODE CALCULATOR.
This allows you to put in 2 postcodes and it will let you know the distance : 'as the crow flies' rather than along roads - it will only take the first part of the postcode e.g. PE30, but is a useful little application.

Can I also mention Tony Cassidy's recent posting on Global Warming in Antarctica. Although it is not related to SVALBARD, a lot of the processes that are mentioned are relevant to us too. Remember that you need to be able to talk about some of the Physical processes in the area - as shown in the past paper question you had recently.
Refer to GLACIAL processes which happen, and also WEATHERING processes which occur because of the low temperatures.
Remember also that you will need to know the definitions of the 5 terms which make up the word FUGIS. Not all of you could do this easily, and you MUST be able to write these - we shall be testing this as we get nearer the exam, but you can make a start now.