Which topic carries the most marks in the WACE Geography external exam?

Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3) carries 38.1% of the marks across the 4 SCSA papers from 2020 to 2025, ahead of Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4) on 38.0%.

How are marks split between question types in the WACE Geography exam?

Short answer carries 43.3% of the marks, extended response carries 42.6% of the marks and multiple choice carries 14.2% of the marks, measured across 4 papers and 564 marks from 2020 to 2025.

Has the topic balance changed in recent WACE Geography papers?

Yes. Geographical Skills (Unit 3) moved down 4.3 percentage points and Geographical Skills (Unit 4) moved up 5.8 percentage points between the 2020 to 2022 and 2024 to 2025 papers.

How many past papers is this WACE Geography analysis based on?

4 SCSA external papers from 2020 to 2025, covering 141 questions and 564 marks. 0.0% of those marks carry no dot-point mapping and sit outside the percentages.

WACE Geography most tested topics

Across the four SCSA Geography external papers from 2020 to 2025, Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3) carries 38.1% of the marks against 0.8% for Geographical Inquiry Skills (Unit 4), so the paper rewards Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3) more than any other topic. At dot-point level 3.1.4.4 carries 7.4% of paper marks, and 57 of the 141 dot points that the board assesses externally have not appeared in one of these papers. Every percentage below covers the 100.0% of marks that map to a syllabus dot point.

Computed from 4 SCSA Geography external papers, 2020 to 2025: 141 questions, 165 question parts and 564 marks.

Unit, topic and dot-point shares below are of the 564 marks that map to a dot point, so each of those tables adds to 100%. 59 of the 165 parts are assessed against more than one dot point, and their 194 marks are divided evenly between the dot points they cover.

What these papers are

Year	Exam	Questions	Marks
2025	Exam	34	144
2024	Exam	36	140
2022	Exam	35	140
2020	Exam	36	140

Marks by unit

Unit	Share of marks
Unit 3: Global environmental change	57.5%
Unit 4: Planning sustainable places	42.5%

Marks by topic

Topic	Share of marks	Papers it appears in	Years
Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	38.1%	4 of 4	4 of 6
Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	38.0%	4 of 4	4 of 6
Geographical Skills (Unit 3)	18.5%	4 of 4	4 of 6
Geographical Skills (Unit 4)	3.6%	3 of 4	3 of 6
Geographical Inquiry Skills (Unit 3)	0.9%	3 of 4	3 of 6
Geographical Inquiry Skills (Unit 4)	0.8%	3 of 4	3 of 6

Marks by subtopic

Each topic above breaks into the subtopics below, in the same order.

Subtopic	Share of marks	Papers
Depth study two	17.1%	4 of 4
Overview of type, rate, extent, causes and consequences of land cover change	8.3%	4 of 4
Depth study one (Global climate change)	6.7%	4 of 4
Depth study one (Loss of Biodiversity)	5.9%	4 of 4
Depth study one (Western Australia)	14.7%	4 of 4
Depth study two (Megacity)	14.2%	4 of 4
Overview of Places and their challenges	9.1%	4 of 4
Mapping skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 3)	12.9%	4 of 4
Remote sensing skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 3)	3.1%	4 of 4
Geographical and statistical data skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 3)	2.5%	4 of 4
Mapping skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 4)	2.1%	1 of 4
Geographical and statistical data skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 4)	1.0%	3 of 4
Remote sensing skills (Geographical Skills, Unit 4)	0.5%	1 of 4
Interpreting, analysing and concluding (Geographical Inquiry Skills, Unit 3)	0.8%	3 of 4
Communicating	0.1%	1 of 4
Interpreting, analysing and concluding (Geographical Inquiry Skills, Unit 4)	0.8%	3 of 4

Marks by dot point

Dot-point numbers and wording are SCSA's own. Where a dot point is written as a list, its items run together here separated by semicolons.

Dot point	Content	Topic	Share of marks	Papers
3.1.4.4	evaluate the two strategies designed to address the impacts of land cover change, using the concept of sustainability	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	7.4%	3 of 4
4.1.2.3	explain the scope and causes of the challenge, and the impacts for the place	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	5.1%	3 of 4
4.1.3.3	explain the scope and causes of the challenge and impacts for the selected megacity	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	4.6%	3 of 4
3.1.4.2	discuss how two strategies aim to mitigate either global climate change or loss of biodiversity	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	4.3%	3 of 4
4.1.2.4	discuss the views of two stakeholder groups related to the challenge	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	3.5%	2 of 4
3.1.4.3	explain two strategies designed to address the impacts of land cover change on local and/or regional environments	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	3.2%	2 of 4
4.1.3.4	explain two planning strategies used to address the challenge	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	3.2%	2 of 4
4.1.2.2	explain the following demographic characteristics: age, gender, socioeconomic and cultural distributions	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	2.8%	2 of 4
4.1.3.2	explain the following demographic characteristics: age, gender, socioeconomic and cultural distributions	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	2.8%	2 of 4
4.1.1.4	outline the economic and environmental interdependence of urban and rural places	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	2.7%	3 of 4
3.3.1.4	establish position on a map using alphanumeric grid coordinates, eastings and northings, four figure area references, six figure grid references, and latitude and longitude expressed in degrees and minutes	Geographical Skills (Unit 3)	2.2%	4 of 4
3.1.1.8	explain two of the following impacts of land cover change: changes to the water cycle; soil erosion and/or degradation; loss of habitat and biodiversity; loss of ecosystem services; urban heat islands; the degradation of aquatic and/or marine environments	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	2.1%	3 of 4
3.1.4.1	discuss three ways human activity has adapted, or may be required to adapt, to either global climate change or loss of biodiversity	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	2.1%	1 of 4
4.1.2.6	evaluate the extent to which the two planning strategies used to address the challenge, have or will enhance the place’s liveability	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	2.1%	1 of 4
4.1.3.6	evaluate the extent to which two planning strategies used to address the challenge, has or will enhance the place’s liveability	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4)	2.1%	1 of 4
3.1.1.5	outline the impacts of growing affluence and advances in technology on the type, rate and extent of land cover change	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	1.9%	4 of 4
3.1.1.1	define the concepts of environment, natural and anthropogenic biomes, land cover change, ecosystem structure and dynamics, biodiversity loss, climate change and sustainability	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	1.8%	4 of 4
3.1.2.3	explain two natural and two anthropogenic causes and rate of declining biodiversity	Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3)	1.8%	2 of 4
3.3.1.11	construct simple annotated sketch maps using map conventions, including border, title, legend, north point and approximate scale	Geographical Skills (Unit 3)	1.8%	3 of 4
3.3.3.4	interpret and construct tables and graphs (e.g. picture graphs; line, bar and compound graphs; histograms; scattergrams; climatic graphs; pie graphs; flowcharts, population pyramids)	Geographical Skills (Unit 3)	1.8%	4 of 4

These 20 dot points carry 59.3% of the paper marks between them. Another 64 assessed dot points share the rest, and 57 of the 141 externally assessable dot points have not been assessed in any of these 4 papers. Content that has not appeared is still examinable.

What has moved between papers

Comparing the 2020 to 2022 papers with the 2024 to 2025 papers, two topics have moved by more than 3.0 percentage points.

Topic	2020 to 2022 share	2024 to 2025 share	Movement
Geographical Skills (Unit 3)	20.7%	16.4%	down 4.3 points
Geographical Skills (Unit 4)	0.7%	6.5%	up 5.8 points

How the papers are built

The marks split across short answer on 43.3% and extended response on 42.6%.

Question type	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
Short answer	43.3%	244	61
Extended response	42.6%	240	24
Multiple choice	14.2%	80	80

Verb	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
describe	31.4%	177	32
explain	20.4%	115	16
evaluate	10.6%	60	5
select	8.5%	48	4
discuss	6.4%	36	3
assess	4.3%	24	2
label	2.7%	15	3
outline	2.3%	13	4

What these percentages do not tell you

Where to practise

Every topic above links to its own page of real SCSA questions with marking criteria and average scores attached: Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 3), Geographical Knowledge and Understanding (Unit 4), Geographical Skills (Unit 3), Geographical Skills (Unit 4), Geographical Inquiry Skills (Unit 3) and Geographical Inquiry Skills (Unit 4). For the full question bank start at WACE Geography.

Syllabus and assessment material referenced in this guide is used under licence, © School Curriculum and Standards Authority. See our SCSA licensing notice. The School Curriculum and Standards Authority does not endorse this publication or product.