Geography

What are the Important Parallels of the Earth?

(In order top to bottom) North Pole Arctic Pole Tropic of Cancer Equator Tropic of Capricorn Antarctic Circle South Pole

Maximum number of degrees for longitude measurements

180 degrees

What is your longitude if you are halfway around the earth to the west of the Prime Meridian?

180 degrees West

How many miles of a great circle extend

25,000 miles since it is circumference of the earth

What is your latitude if youʻre halfway between equator and the North Pole?

45 degrees North. Equatorʻs value= 0 degrees, North Pole= 90 degrees North. So halfway is 45 Degrees north

What is your longitude if you are one-fourth of the way around the earth to the east of the Prime Meridian?

90 degrees East. There are 360 degrees around earth, so 1/4=90 degrees

Maps

A flat representation of Earth at a reduced scale (2D)

What is Circle of Illumination?

Circle that divides the earth into day and night hemispheres

parallelism

Earthʻs rotation axis which stays the same throughout its revolution

Where is the Prime Meridian located?

Greenwich, England

What is a great circle?

Largest circle that can be drawn on a sphere. represents the earthʻs circumference and is formed by a plane passing through center of the earth.

Term for Distance of Parallels

Latitude

Term for Distance of Meridians

Longitude

Which parallel on the geographic grid is a great circle?

Only the equator

Revolution

Orbit of the earth around the sun taking 365 days for one complete cycle

What are the Important Meridians of the Earth?

Prime Meridian, International Date Line

Globes

Spherical representation of the earth (3D)

Angle of inclination

The earthʻs tilt which is 23.5 degrees away from being perpendicular to the ecliptic plane

Another great circle that divides the earth into two hemispheres

The equator divided northern and southern hemispheres

Plane of the Ecliptic

The orbital plane of the earth

Equivalence

When the size ratio of any area on map to the corresponding area on the ground is the same all over the map

What are Small Circles?

circles formed when the plane divides a sphere into two equal halves and does not pass through the center of the earth. (All parallels, except for equator are small circles)

Why are great circles important?

for navigators because they represent the shortest distance between any two points on the earthʻs surface

subsolar point

location on the Earth where the sun is directly overhead. or where point of earth is situated directly beneath the sun

Large Scale map

map that shows a small area, but it shows it in great detail (eg: city map)

Small scale map

map that shows more territory, but less detail (eg: world map)

Rotation

one complete spin around the central point of earth taking 24 hours

Isolines

one of most widespread devices for portraying spatial distribution; any line that joins points of equal value of something

Perihelion

point in Earth's orbit when it is closest to the sun occurring January 3 or 4 (opposite of Aphelion)

Aphelion

point in the Earth's orbit when it is farthest from the sun occurring July 3 or 4 (opposite of Perihelion)

Analemma

position of the sun in the sky at the same time everyday making a path of the figure 8

Daylight- Savings Time

practice of advancing clocks during the lighter months so that evenings have more daylight and mornings have less

Conic projection

projecting the markings of a center lit globe onto a cone wrapped tangent to, or intersecting, portion of globe

Plane projection

projecting the markings of a center-lit globe onto a flat piece of paper that is tangent to the globe at some point

Map scale

ratio between distances on a map compared to actual distance on earthʻs surface

Cylindrical projection

roughly football-shaped map, usually of entire world

Map Projections

the representation of any part of the surface of the earth on a plane surface

solstice

two times in the year, the summer solstice and the winter solstice , when the sun reaches its highest or lowest point in the sky at noon, marked by the longest and shortest days.

equinox

when the sun crosses the plane of the earth's equator, making night and day of approximately equal length all over the earth. Approximately March 20-21 and September 21-22.

Conformality

where the proper angular relationships are maintained so that the shape of something on the map is the same as its shape on earth