Geography

What are some common

perceptions of Africa?
LO
To know the countries of Africa have a wide range of
opportunities, challenges and lifestyles.

To know there is no ‘one size fits all’ stereotype that

can be applied to the people of Africa.

Bridges: Through noticing

AFRICA

OR

NOT ?
You are about to see 16 images. The photos
were taken in many different countries.

Your task is to decide if each photo was taken

in an African country or not and write it down in
tour draft book.

It would be useful to look for clues in each

photo so that rather than guessing, you had
some evidence for your answers.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
 AFRICA
OR
NOT ?

Answers…
Please self assess your
answers in a green pen
Answers:
1. AFRICA – lorry drivers in Sudan.
2. AFRICA – teenage girls in South Africa.
3. AFRICA – a wedding in Sudan.
4. AFRICA – an advert for baby products in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
5. AFRICA – a view over the city of Cape Town in South Africa
6. AFRICA – modern electric railway system in Morocco
7. AFRICA – football stadium in Ghana
8. AFRICA - primary school children in Kenya
9. AFRICA – airport red carpet for the arrival of the Malawi president
10. AFRICA – a church in South Africa
11. AFRICA – fruit and vegetable stall in South Africa
12. AFRICA – large modern fishing boats in the harbour in Morocco
13. AFRICA – modern city building in Equatorial Guinea.
14. NOT AFRICA – masai tribesman working in a wildlife park in California, USA.
15. AFRICA – McDonalds restaurant in Morocco
16. AFRICA – cape penguins in South Africa.
And just in case you were thinking obviously they don't use mobile
phones in African countries………….
Well they do!!
Africa Word Association
You have two minutes to
write down between five
and ten words to do with
Africa
What different categories can we put these in? E.g.
positive, negative, history, opinion, facts
Read through the ‘perceptions of
Africa’ on slides 25 and 26 which is
about bias and how people and the
media perceives Africa.
Answer the 2 questions in your book:
a) What impression does it give Impression =
opinion, point of
you about life in Africa? Use view
some of the highlighted words
in your answer.

b) Choose some of these words to

write a paragraph of your own
about life in Africa or try to
describe the image of life in Africa
that is created by the use of this
set of words.
Perceptions of life in Africa – how do we know what life is like in
the countries of Africa?

Even if we have not visited a place, we all have an image in

our minds of what that place is like – this what we mean
when we say, this what we perceive the place to be like.
Where does this information come from? Unless you know
someone who has visited a place, it is likely that you will
form your opinions from the media – what you read, what
you hear and what you see. Sometimes an ‘expert’ may tell
you about a place – your teacher for example. These
experts may or may not have visited a place but they have
learnt something about it and they share their knowledge
and understanding about that place with you.
When we learn about a place for the first time, what is the
best source of information? Who do we trust?
When we have only small pieces of information, it does not
help to give us a fair impression of what a place is like. If
the information we use contains bias, we may get the
wrong idea about what the place is like.
Africa is a continent but often the media talks about Africa as if it
is one country and is all the same everywhere you go. As a general
rule, the media loves reporting ‘bad news’ and only rarely reports
‘good news’. Have a look at the table of words below which are
taken from a single web page from the BBC news website.
a) What impression does it give you about life in Africa? Use some
of the highlighted words in your answer.
b) Choose some of these words to write a paragraph of your own
about life in Africa or try to describe the image of life in Africa that
is created by the use of this set of words.
Note: The word ‘Aid’ refers to money or food sent to help people in
African countries and the word ‘Aids’ refers to the disease which kills
millions of men, women and children in Africa each year.
Ethiopian hardships in meltdown Starting from scratch
Food crisis Village’s food Hunger and misery
shortages
History of drought Struggling to eat Animals starve
Aid figures starves Drought-stricken
community
Affected countries GM struggle Food aid addiction
Recurring hunger crisis Hungry herders : fertile but hungry
Digging for scarce water Deadly daily poverty More harm than good
Dried-up riverbeds with Aids The struggle to survive
Watch the video and write down 2 positive and 2 negative things you
see about Africa.

Imagine that you are travelling across the continent

of Africa - either from east to west or from north to
south. write down some of the differences that they
might see on your journey as you pass through
some of the 54 different countries. They should try
to include an equal number of positive and negative
things that they might see.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtOamrNv58M
 Complete an information poster on a country in Africa
My country is __________________.
Success criteria:
 Location - Maps and Flags
 Tourist attractions (include pictures and place details, where can people go
and what people can do there)
 Currency
 Population (Even better if it includes population change over a period of
last 50 years)
 Development indicators (literacy rates, life expectancy, GDP)
 Any other interesting information (food, dance, languages, culture and
traditions)
 Pictures
Stretch for WBE:

Complete the ‘how does food

connect us to Africa ?’sheet on
the next slide.