How do globes help us

Latitude lines measure distances north or south of the equator. Lines of longitude , or meridians , run north and south.

The prime meridian is the important line of longitude. Half of the lines of longitude are west of the prime meridian, and half are east of it. Longitude lines measure distances east and west. That is halfway around the earth from the prime meridian. The place where a line of latitude crosses a line of longitude is called the absolute location.

Is there a place on the earth with no latitude and longitude? It's a point in the Atlantic Ocean, off the west coast of Africa. This is where the prime meridian and the equator meet.

The imaginary lines on globes and maps help locate any place on the earth. Lines of latitude circle the earth. Latitude describes how far north or south from the equator a place is. Lines of longitude run through the poles. Longitude describes how far east or west a place is located from the prime meridian. Globes are a great way to see what the earth looks like. But they are difficult to carry around.

They cannot show you details of your city or your state. As people explored where they lived or traveled, they recorded information. They noted islands, mountains, and bodies of water. People used this information and made flat maps.

This ancient city was near Baghdad in Iraq. The map was carved into clay. A map is a flat drawing of all or part of the earth's surface. It shows where places and things are located. Maps also show how things are connected to each other. They show size, distance, and direction. Some maps include physical features. They show lakes, mountains, and rivers.

Other maps show where people live. These maps might show political features, such as cities and country boundaries. To read a map, first look at the title.

The title explains the subject of the map. Maps also have a compass. This symbol is called a compass rose.

It tells the cardinal directions of north N , south S , east E , and west W. The compass rose also has four intermediate directions. If the earth was cut in half, this imaginary point would be intersected by a line drawn from the North Pole to the South Pole and by a line drawn from the equator on one side of the earth to the equator on the other Fig.

A radius is a line drawn from the edge of a circle to its center. To calculate the angle, draw a line from the point to the center of the earth and a line from the equator to the center of the earth Fig. Parallels of latitude are imaginary reference lines that form complete circles around the earth parallel to the equator and parallel to each other.

Every point on a parallel of latitude is the same distance from the equator, and thus the angle formed between the equator and the latitude line is constant. This is shown in Fig. Parallels of latitude are circles of different sizes see Fig. The largest parallel is at the equator, and the parallels decrease in size towards the poles.

The greater the distance from the equator, either north or south, the higher the latitude. Meridians of longitude are imaginary half-circles running from the North Pole to the South Pole.

They are sometimes called lines of longitude. Unlike parallels of latitude that are different sizes, all lines of longitude are the same length. These divisions of the equatorial circle are used to label the meridians. Meridians are numbered east and west from the prime meridian Fig. Places to the east of the prime meridian have east longitude. The international date line determines where on earth the date changes. For example, at the same moment the time is am on July 1st in Bangladesh, the time is pm on June 30th in Mexico and midnight on June 30th in England see Fig.

Places located immediately to the right and left of the date line are 24 hours apart. Travelers who cross the dateline heading west lose a day, but travelers who cross the dateline going east gain a day.

When traveling east across the dateline, it is actually possible to arrive at your destination earlier than when you left! For practical purposes, the international date line has been adjusted to allow certain land areas to remain together in the same day and time zones. For example, the extreme eastern tip of Russia, which juts into the Bering Strait, was kept in the easternmost time zone, whereas the U. In another example, the country of Kiribati pronounced KIRR-i-bas drastically changed the date line in so that the entire country could be on the same day at the same time.

Before this, the western part of Kiribati, where the capital lies, would be 22 hours ahead of the eastern portion of the county.

Lines of latitude and longitude form an imaginary global grid system, shown in Fig. Any point on the globe can be located exactly by specifying its latitude and longitude. This system is essential for ships at sea that cannot locate their positions using landmarks or coastal navigational aids such as buoys or channel markers. This system is just as useful for people on land when hiking, driving, or surveying an environment.

Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. Press ESC to cancel. Skip to content Home Psychology Why is the globe important? Ben Davis April 13, Why is the globe important? What are the uses of a globe? Why is globe and map important?

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