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Delta and Island

Run the Delta and Island MicroSim Fullscreen

About This MicroSim

Delta and Island puts two very different kinds of land side by side.

  • Bangladesh: the Bengal Delta. Three great rivers, the Padma (Ganges), the Jamuna (Brahmaputra) and the Meghna, meet and flow into the Bay of Bengal. A monsoon river level slider raises the water, and the lowest land, near the rivers and the coast, floods first. The share of land under water is illustrative, not real data, because the land heights are made up to show the idea. The two preset buttons match two documented figures: about 21% of Bangladesh floods in an average year, and more than two-thirds of the country flooded in 1998.
  • Sri Lanka: an island. A stylized island (not a traced outline) with schematic central highlands and dots for Jaffna, Anuradhapura, Kandy, Sri Pada (Adam's Peak), Colombo and Galle.

Tap any dot to read a short card about that place. No borders are drawn, and the caption "Schematic map, not to scale. Not an official depiction of borders." appears inside the drawing area.

How to Use

  1. Read the "Compare the two" card at the bottom.
  2. Press Average year. Notice which land floods: the land along the rivers, around Dhaka and toward the coast.
  3. Press Extreme year (1998). Which parts stay dry?
  4. Tap Dhaka, Chattogram and the Sundarbans.
  5. On the island, tap Anuradhapura, Kandy, Sri Pada, Colombo, Galle and Jaffna. Notice how the highlands sit in the south-center and the old capitals moved over time.

Learning Objective

Students will be able to explain how geography shapes life in Bangladesh (a low, flat river delta where floods are both a danger and a source of fertile soil) and in Sri Lanka (an island with central highlands, coasts and an ancient dry-zone heartland).

Bloom level: Understand (explain, compare).

Iframe Embed Code

<iframe src="https://aaryavvatts-lab.github.io/south-asian-culture-textbook/sims/ch19-bangladesh-srilanka-compare/main.html" height="932px" width="100%" scrolling="no"></iframe>

Lesson Plan

Grade level: 9 to 12 (world geography, environmental science, ethnic studies, or a South Asian student club meeting)

Duration: 15 to 20 minutes

Activity:

  1. (5 min) Students press Average year and Extreme year and sketch which parts of the delta flood first and which stay dry.
  2. (4 min) In pairs, students list two ways a flood can hurt a farm and one way it can help.
  3. (5 min) Students tap every Sri Lanka dot and sort the places into "ancient capital," "port," "hill country" and "north."
  4. (4 min) Exit ticket: one sentence comparing how water shapes life in each country.

Assessment questions:

  1. Which three rivers meet in the Bengal Delta?
  2. About how much of Bangladesh floods in an average year, and how much flooded in 1998?
  3. Why does the eastern part of the schematic delta stay dry longest?
  4. Which Sri Lankan place is sacred to Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Christians?
  5. Why is the flooded share in the simulation called "illustrative"?

Chapter 19: Bangladesh and Sri Lanka