Maps

The Earth

can be shown on a globe,

or on a world map.

A continent, like North America,

can be shown on a map, too.

And a country, like France,

can be shown on a map.

On a political map, different colors can mean different countries.

Look—Germany is purple, and Spain is red. What color is France?

Sometimes, different colors mean different states. What color is California?

The lines between countries are the borders. Can you find the border line between the United States and Canada?

On most maps, cities are shown as little dots. Can you find some cities on this map?

Sometimes, a capital of a country is shown with a star. Do you see some stars on this map? Do you see the capitals of China and India?

Some maps show big highways

as red lines, like the Interstate Highways on this United States map.

You can find out what different lines and marks on a map mean, from the map key or legend. It’s in a box that looks like this.

Can you find the map key on this map of Canada?

There is another kind of map, called a relief map. It shows tall mountains in brown and low plains in green.

Maps can show rivers, like the Nile River.

This map shows the Nile River as a curvy blue line.

Smaller blue lines run into the big line. Those are rivers, too.

The Nile is the longest river in Africa. Can you find the Nile? Do you see other rivers?

On most maps, light blue means an ocean, sea, or lake. Can you find some lakes on this map?

Can you find some seas on this map?

And do you see the oceans on this map? (The land is colored green.)

At the bottom of oceans, there are tall, wet mountains and valleys. We cannot see them, because it is dark at the bottom of the ocean, and they are covered with water.

But those underwater mountains are shown on maps of the ocean floor!

The End