Welcome to this deck on river landscapes in the UK. This is an optional topic for Paper 1 of your AQA GCSE Geography exam, so please check with your teacher that you are studying it. We will explore how rivers shape the land through erosion, transportation, and deposition, and look at the distinctive landforms they create from their source in the mountains to their mouth at the sea.

The journey of a river from its source to its mouth can be shown on a diagram called a long profile. It's essentially a line graph showing the change in the river's gradient, or steepness, over its entire course. Typically, the long profile is steep in the upper course, has a gentler gradient in the middle course, and is almost flat in the lower course as it approaches the sea.

As well as a long profile, we can look at a river's cross-profile, which is a view of the valley from one side to the other. The shape of this cross-profile changes dramatically along the river's course. In the upper course, where the river is high up and has a lot of energy for vertical erosion, it carves out a steep-sided, narrow valley.

As the river flows into its middle and lower course, it has less vertical erosive power and more energy for lateral, or sideways, erosion. This, combined with deposition, creates a much wider and flatter valley floor. The river channel itself also becomes wider and deeper.