Rivers
Today’s Agenda:
-Slide show on Rivers
-What are rivers?
-Why are they important?
-What is responsible for creating a river?
-What are the different parts of rivers?
-Create a River Individual Assignment
What are rivers?
• Rivers are one of the most important physical features because they play a
huge role in shaping our world.
• A river is: a large natural stream of water flowing in a channel to the sea, a
lake, or another stream.
• Rivers have many different parts to them and are more complicated than
many people think.
Why are rivers important?
• Many cities are located on rivers. Winnipeg, Montreal, Vancouver, London
and Moscow were all built on river banks.
• Why? People depend on rivers for transportation, fresh water and what
else?
• How could people use it for _____?
How do rivers form/work?
• Rivers often appear to go on forever, but they do start and end
somewhere.
• Source/headwater is the location where the river begins. This is often a
series of underground springs, melting glaciers, lakes or other rivers
(tributaries).
• Most water in a river comes from surface runoff (rain or snow).
• Rivers flow from the highest point of land in an area to the lowest.
However, some rivers flow south and north!
• The high land the sends one river one way and the other river another way
is called a divide.
• Oak Ridges Moraine is a divide that send one river north to lake Simcoe
and south to Lake Ontario.
What are the different parts?
• Tributary: a river or stream flowing into a
larger river or lake.
• Tributaries flow into the main channel of the
river.
Parts continued
• Meanders are large twists or turns in a river, often in the shape of a
U.
• They are created by the dragging of soil and rock in a particular year
and time, which creates new obstacles, or paths for water to flow
based on speed and force.
• An oxbow lake (pg 179) is a U-shaped body of water that forms
when a wide meander from the main stem of a river is cut off,
creating a free-standing body of water
Parts continued
• A confluence is a place where two rivers meet.
• A Confluence brings two rivers together to
join the main channel/main branch.
Parts continued
• Delta’s are landforms that form where the
river flows into an ocean, sea, estuary, lake.
• These oceans, seas, estuaries and lakes are
called the mouth of the river.
Patterns of a river
• Dendritic Drainage Pattern: Most rivers follow
this pattern and look like a leaf. The main vein
is the channel of the river and the small veins
as tributaries. These rivers usually form in a
gently sloping area.
Guided Reading
• Pg 167. Overview of lake components.
• Pg 168. Where is a/the source(s)? Where is a
divide?
Where is the mouth? Where do we see a
confluence? Tributaries? Is this a dendritic
(leaf) pattern?
• Pg 178. Good example of sources, confluence,
delta, mouths, tributaries, divides.
What we have learned
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Source/headwater is the location where the river begins
Tributary: a river or stream flowing into a larger river or lake.
Meanders are large twists or turns in a river, often in the shape of a U.
An oxbow lake (pg 179) is a U-shaped body of water that forms when a wide
meander from the main stem of a river is cut off, creating a free-standing body of
water.
A confluence is a place where two rivers meet.
Delta’s are where the river flows into the mouth (an ocean, lake etc)
Dendritic Drainage Pattern(leaf pattern: The main vein is the channel of the river
and the small veins as tributaries. These rivers usually form in a gently sloping
area.