The changing British city

Are you still teaching early 20th - century theory about the growth of cities in the 21st century? This article by Professor Brian Robson of Manchester University can update your knowledge and help make your lessons more relevant and motivating for your students.

Ideas for teaching about cities

• Does your nearest big city fulfil its role as a place of consumption as described in the section 'Reinventing the city'? Brainstorm ideas.
• Construct a Venn diagram with two circles. In one put the services that students might use, in the other put those used by adults. How many are the same? Do the same for leisure and consumer goods? Discuss how the resulting diagrams might affect the layout of a city.
• Show a clip of Coronation Street or East Enders. Note down the services available in the areas shown in the programmes. How do these compare to the services outlined in the article?
• Look at the listings for lifestyle programmes in a TV magazine or paper. How do these reflect the main points in the article?
• Draw a timeline to show the changes in a city over time and through space.
• Show change as a living graph.

Other information

www.renewal.net (useful background on regeneration) www.planex.ndirect.co.uk (the Planning Exchange at Glasgow has updates on current issues)
www.odpm.gov.uk (the odpm website has a section on regeneration and covers all the urban policy initiatives)
www.neighbourhood.statistics.gov.uk (the National Neighbourhood Statistics database provides a welter of ward-based data across England that students could interpret).