Grids

Today in class we talked more about maps. We learned that the definition of geography is the study of where things are on Earth's surface and the reason for their location. Geographers use maps to answer two questions. Where are people and activities found on Earth? The second question is "Why are they found there?" A map is a two-dimensional or a flat scale model of the Earth's surface or a portion of it. Cartography is the art and science of mapmaking. Maps have two purposes, as a reference tool to identify an object's absolute and relative location and as a communication tool to convey the distribution of human activity or physical features. Absolute location is the position as expressed in degrees, minutes, and seconds of latitude and longitude. Relative location is the regional position or situation of a place relative to the position of other places. We also learned about latitude and longitude lines. Latitude lines are a geographic coordinate of imaginary lines parallel to the equator, used to measure degrees north or south of the equator.