Definitions
What is a Compass Rose?
A symbol on a map that shows the cardinal directions.
A unit of latitude or longitude used to define points on the earth's surface or on the celestial sphere.
What are Degrees(as in location)?
North (N), east (E), south (S), west (W), at 90° angles on the compass rose.
What are the Cardinal Directions?
What is a Bay?
A broad inlet of the sea where the land curves inward.
What is the Equator?
An imaginary line around the middle of a planet or other celestial body.
What is Distortion(on a map)?
The misrepresentation of shape, area, distance, or direction of or between geographic features when compared to their true measurements on the curved surface of the earth.
Formed by bisecting the above, giving: northeast (NE), southeast (SE), southwest (SW) and northwest (NW).
What are the Four Intercardinal (or ordinal) Directions?
A large body of water surrounded by land.
What is a Lake?
A body of land surrounded by water.
What is an Island?
A high point of land that extends into a river, lake, or ocean.
What is a Cape?
A body of water sheltered by natural or artificial barriers. Provides safe anchorage and permits the transfer of cargo and passengers between ships and the shore.
What is a Harbor?
What are Lines of Latitude?
Imaginary lines that divide the Earth. They run east to west, but measure your distance north or south.
What are Lines of Longitude?
Imaginary lines that divide the Earth. They run north to south from pole to pole, but they measure the distance east or west.
What is the Prime Meridian?
A geographical reference line that passes through the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, in London, England.
What is a Valley?
A low area that’s between a hill and mountain.
The study of the physical features of the earth and its atmosphere, and of human activity as it affects and is affected by these, including the distribution of populations and resources, land use, and industries.
What is Geography?
What is a Gulf?
A portion of the ocean that penetrates land.
A rising landform that grows higher than the area around it on one side.
What is a Plateau?
A lake or an inlet of the sea.
What is a Lock/Loch?
What is an Archipelago?
A group of islands.
What is a Delta?
Wetlands that form as rivers empty their water and sediment into another body of water.
A long, deep, narrow body of water that reaches far inland.
What is a Fjord?
What is the Tributary?
The branch that flows into the mainstream to the White River, the Arkansas River and Red River.
What is an Isthmus?
A narrow piece of land connecting two larger areas across an expanse of water by which they are otherwise separated.
The narrow passage is the water connecting to the two seas or in large waters.
What is a Strait?