Inquiry into the Issue

Inquiry into the Issue

Economic and political decisions influence your quality of life every day. As a citizen of Canada, you have the responsibility to be involved actively in the economic and political decision-making processes of your province and your country.

Consider the images in the document, Issues Through Images. (The link to the document is below.)

Each image shows some form of human interaction with the environment, and each shows human use of natural resources. Natural resources are a valuable part of our ecosystem on Earth. They are also valuable to the economy. In fact, using those natural resources is essential to human life. However, exploitation of these resources is resulting in changes to the natural environment.

• What are the positive impacts (+) and the negative impacts (-) on the environment and your quality of life depicted in each of the images?

Complete the Issues Through Images handout. Click on one of the links below to access the activity.

Issues Through Images (Word)
Issues Through Images (pdf)
Issues Through Images (Google Doc)

Save your completed handout to your Activities folder.
 

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Inquiry Activity

Click on the following link to view the Alberta Tomorrow Introduction Movie.

Note: When the site opens, you will need to click on the "Now Playing" box under the title Introduction.

https://albertatomorrow.ca/videos/

When the video starts playing, you can click on the two arrows in the bottom right corner to make the video full screen. Stop the video at 3:32.

As you watch the video, identify how people, industry, and government may interact with the environment.

This interaction is called land use and includes such interactions as agriculture and urban development. Land use may have a positive impact on the environment; however, it may also have a negative impact.


Locally, provincially, nationally, and globally, citizens and governments are concerned with land use and sustainable development, which is the fine balance between maintaining or improving quality of life while preserving natural resources, biodiversity, and ecosystems for future generations. When an ecosystem is healthy, its abiotic elements and biotic elements are in balance and sustainable.

The Alberta Tomorrow video introduces you to environmental issues applying to your province. Decisions about the environment are made at the political level. The environmental policy usually depends on the party that is in power at the time. The economic and environmental impacts resulting from land use are important issues affecting all Canadians.

land use: human interaction with the environment, such as agriculture, forestry, and oil and gas production

sustainable development: maintaining or improving quality of life while ensuring the preservation of natural resources and ecosystems for future generations

biodiversity: the number, variety, and variability of living organisms on Earth, between ecosystems, between species, and within species

ecosystem: a complex system formed by the relationships and interactions among the living organisms of a particular self-sustaining environment, with their resources, and with their habitat

Everything that lives in an ecosystem is dependent on other species and elements of that ecological community.

abiotic: the non-living elements of an environment, such as air, temperature, and wind

biotic: the living organisms of an environment


Vocabulary

Add the terms and definitions for land use, sustainable development, biodiversity, ecosystem, abiotic, and biotic to your Issues for Canadians Definitions handout.

Save your updated handout to your Activities folder.

The landscape you see in Alberta today is very different from the historic landscape seen by Aboriginal peoples and early settlers. Alberta's land composition is changing due to land-use practices. The various land-use practices are a result of political and economic decisions. These decisions create both economic benefits and environmental impacts or consequences.

Who decides what happens to the Alberta landscape? How is the quality of life of Alberta's citizens affected by the political and economic decisions made?   It is important for both the federal government and the provincial government to consider the environmental, social, and economic issues when making decisions regarding land use.

Making these decisions is challenging because it involves various stakeholders with various goals. The decisions governments make affect the quality of life of each and every Albertan by influencing the health of Alberta's environment, Alberta's economy, and Alberta's communities.

Consider the way land is used in your community and the surrounding area.

Complete the Land Use Chart by clicking on one of the following links.

Land Use Chart (Word)
Land Use Chart (pdf)
Land Use Chart (Google Doc)

Save your completed chart to your Activities folder.

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