Remember the belt loops are for the scout doing their best to learn about the sport or academic activity, and by putting the new techniques to practice with fellow scouts, in their community, or working with an adult.

1. Draw a map of your neighborhood. Show natural and man-made features. Include a key or legend of map symbols.

2. Learn about the physical geography of your community. Identify the major landforms within 100 miles. Discuss with an adult what you learned.

3. Use a world globe or map to locate the continents, the oceans , the equator, and the northern and southern hemispheres. Learn how longitude and latitude lines are used to locate a site.

Elements of a Good Map

• Title, author, and date. The title can tell you whether the map will give the information for which you are looking. The date and author will give you clues as to the accuracy of the map (i.e., an old map may not be very up-to-date).

• Scale. Scale is the system that reduces the land and oceans to sizes that fit on paper. On maps of large areas, the scale is usually measured in miles (or kilometers) per inch (or centimeter). Some maps might measure small areas in feet per inch.

• Directions. A map should show the cardinal (main) directions of north, south, east, and west. Most maps have the north at the top, but it is wise to check the compass rose to be sure.

• Key or legend. Maps usually use colors or symbols to represent features, such as roads, buildings, parks, lakes, rivers, or mountains. The only color most cartographers agree about is using blue for water features.

• Projection. A three-dimensional globe is the most accurate map of the earth. Cartographers must cut, stretch, and distort some parts of the earth to get it to appear flat on paper. Some of the these projections are better than others. To see this effect, compare the size of Greenland as represented on a globe and on a flat map.

Finding Longitude and Latitude

On most maps you will see lines that run east and west parallel to the equator, and other lines that run north and south between the North and South Poles. The east-west lines (called parallels because they stay the same distance apart) are lines of latitude. They measure position north or south of the earth's equator. The lines that connect the poles are lines of longitude. They are never parallel because their distance apart varies. Also called meridians, they measure position east or west of the prime meridian, which passes through Greenwich, England.

Example: Imagine that your are listening to a weather report about a hurricane. Many times, weather reporters give the coordinates of the hurricane so that people can follow the storm's movements on their map at home. If the coordinates for a hurricane were given as 18 degrees north latitude and 77 degrees west longitude, you could find the hurricane on a map. Find the parallel of latitude marked 18 degrees north of the equator, and the line of longitude marked 7 degrees west of Greenwich, and follow the two lines until they meet. These coordinates would put the storm near Kingston, Jamaica, in the Caribbean Sea. Try this for yourself on a map or globe.

Resources