IB ESS 2.2-L6 What changes when a landscape changes? Lesson Walkthrough

This 60-minute IB ESS lesson is for SL and HL students on the first-assessment-2026 course.

Students advise a fictional planning council comparing two land-use designs. Area-weighted productivity and standing-biomass calculations challenge a claim that a high-yield crop can replace every function of a forest. A staged stress scenario, a dated CO₂-enrichment finding and competing housing and food objectives require a conditional recommendation rather than a single-indicator verdict. The final transfer integrates the six-lesson common-core energy and biomass sequence.

The teacher walkthrough includes preparation, a five-phase sequence, prompts, response guidance and an optional extension. Teacher-only response guidance is separate from the student reproducibles; no separate answer-key file is supplied.

Included: editable teacher walkthrough in Word and matching 19-page PDF; editable student reproducibles in Word and matching 8-page PDF.

The student resources also appear in the teacher PDF appendix. Fictional cases and model data are identified where used; supplied datasets and simulations are not completed fieldwork. Follow the walkthrough’s preparation and safeguards for practical or digital options.

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