Australia’s population. Review

In the review lesson we link together the topics studied earlier. The geographic envelope consists of the upper lithosphere, hydrosphere, troposphere and biosphere and is about 30–35 km thick; its laws are wholeness, cycling, rhythmicity and zonation. The World Ocean covers 361 million km² and is divided into four (sometimes five) oceans. Africa (about 30 million km²) and Australia (about 7.7 million km²) are both fragments of ancient Gondwana, lie between the tropics on ancient platforms, and both have savannas and deserts. They differ in that Africa is crossed by the equator, is the hottest continent, and has an active rift, high volcanoes and long rivers like the Nile; Australia lies wholly in the Southern Hemisphere, is the smallest, very dry, with few rivers and no volcanoes. Africa has large mammals (elephant, lion, zebra), while many of Australia’s endemic animals are marsupials (kangaroo, koala) or egg-laying mammals (platypus, echidna). An endemic species is one found only in that place. In review, working with the atlas and blank maps is important: distances between extreme points must be calculated using the scale.