ORIENTEERING Orienteering is similar to a cross-country race but you navigate using a map instead of following a set course. It is an outdoor sport where competitors navigate their own way, you can run, jog or walk, you decide your own pace, looking for control points marked on a special map. The control points are marked on an orienteering map. The points on the course are marked with orange and white flags and punches, so you can prove you've been there. The challenge is to use the map to decide the best route to complete the course in the quickest time. Specific vocabulary Orienteering Map Compass. Arrow. Cardinal Points: North. South. East, West. Symbols or legend Routes. Road. Track. Path. Control marker Control Card Punch Clue Sheet Pace: A double step.
1.- WHAT IS A MAP? A map is a picture or representation of the Earth's surface, as if it were observed from an aerial view, showing how things are related to each other by distance, direction, and size. Maps are a way of showing many things about a portion of the earth's surface on a flat piece of paper that can be carried and transported easily. A map is not a photograph of the Earth's surface. It can show many things that a picture cannot show, and as a result, a map looks different in many ways from a photograph of the Earth's surface. Maps have been used for centuries. A person who creates map as a profession is called a cartographer. The most important function of a map is to show location ( where certain things are ). A feature all maps have in common is that they show distances between things. There can be many different maps of the same place. A map can not show everything about a place. For a map to communicate clearly, it must show a limited number of things. That is why maps are made for different reasons. Different maps show different information. For example, some maps are made to show property lines and other maps show us how to get where we want to go ( like road maps ). Pirates used maps to find buried treasure. There are also weather maps which show precipitation ( rain, sleet, snow ) and cold fronts in a particular region.
2.- TYPES OF MAPS Have you ever seen anyone using a map to find their way around town? Maps are used extensively throughout society. Road maps provide information such as street names and landmarks. There are many different types of maps. Some maps are used for forecasting the weather, while others are used to plot the population in an area. Learning to recognize what a map has to offer is an important skill. In the next task you will look at a variety of maps provided by your teacher and determine what you can learn from each type of map. Physical maps show natural features such as mountains, rivers, oceans, and islands. Cultural maps will include people made features such as political boundaries, highways, towns, dams, and oil wells. Cartographers will often show us the smallest details of a place, that is why the scale is very small: 1 : 2.000 1 : 5.000 or 1 : 10.000 They use symbols to stand for different features on a map. Symbols and other information to help you understand the map are usually placed in a box called the map key. Descriptions detailing any colour schemes, symbols or categorization is explained here. Since not all map symbols are the same, it is important to check the key on each map that you use. The symbol will often look like what they represent. They may use the outline of an airplane to show you where the airport is located. Colours, lettering, and lines are also some of the symbols that will be used. You will find that blue will almost always be used to represent water. To be able to use maps, you must know how to read them. The language of a map is really quite simple. A good map will include instructions to help you understand them. Once you have become familiar with the language of maps, you will be able to use them to find out many things.
3.- HOW TO MOVE BY USING A MAP One of the most basic uses of maps is to help you find specific places. All location is relative. You need a starting point. Everything else will be described as being a certain distance and direction from that point. YOU MUST KNOW THAT WHEN Y O U A R E U S I N G A M A P, Y O U R DIRECTION CAN CHANGE BUT THE MAP W I L L A L W A Y S B E I N T H E S A M E POSITION. DO NOT TURN IT. 4.- THE NORTH ARROW Another thing maps will tell us is direction. On most maps north is at the top of the map. North and up are not, however, the same. "Up" is away from the surface of the earth. "North" is toward the North Pole. If you are facing north, east will be to your right, west will be to your left, and south will be behind you. The purpose of the north arrow is for orientation. This allows the viewer to determine the direction of the map as it relates to due north. Most maps tend to be oriented so that due north faces the top of the page. There are exceptions to this and having the north arrow allows the viewer to know which direction the data is oriented.
5.- THE SCALE Maps can do so much more than tell us where and which way. They can tell us how far, but first we must know how to interpret the SCALE. The scale is a relationship that explains the relationship of the data frame extent to the real world. The description is a ratio. This can be shown either as a unit to unit or as one measurement to another measurement. Therefore a scale showing a 1 : 10.000 scale means that everyone paper map unit represents 10.000 real world units. For example 1:10.000 in centimetres means that a measurement of one centimetre on the map equals 10.000 centimetres in real life. In addition to text representation as described above, the ratio can be shown graphically in the form of a scale bar. The scale is usually located in the key box of a map, which explains the symbols and provides other important information about the map
5.1.- HOW TO KNOW HOW FAR: 1. Find the scale for the map you are going to use looking at the bar scale or a written scale, in words or numbers. 2. Use a ruler to measure the distance between the two places. If the line is quite curved, use a string to determine the distance and then measure the string. 3. If the scale is a representative fraction (and looks like 1 : 100.000), multiply the distance of the ruler by the denominator, giving distance in the ruler units. 4. Convert your units of measurement into the most convenient units for you (i.e. convert 63.360 centimetres to kilometres). 6.- WHAT IS A LANDFORM? You are on vacation and you want to take a long hike. The map you are using shows a direct route to where you want to go. As you walk, you find yourself talking to your friend and "splash!" You are in a lake. The map you had did not show landforms. Understanding landforms can help you interpret maps. It is easy to walk up a gentle sloping mountain, but difficult to walk up a very steep canyon. A road can easily be built on flat land, but difficult to make a tunnel if you want to get through a mountain range. Let s learn more about different types of landforms and how they are created. A landform is any feature of the Earth s surface that is produced by nature. This includes plains, plateaus, mountain ranges, or valleys. Roads and streets produced by humans are not landforms. The forces of nature that create landforms include water, ice, wind, volcanoes, and earthquakes. They are divided into landforms created by erosion and landforms created by tectonic activity. As nature works its magic on the surface of the Earth, we get many spectacular views.
7.- WHAT ARE THE CONTOUR LINES? The contour lines is the system used by a topographic map to show or represent the landforms and their height. A contour line is an imaginary line that joins all the same height points. That system consists in cutting the land into several horizontal planes at the same vertical distance. That distance is always constant and is called equidistance. Therefore the equidistance is the constant vertical distance that we climb or descend from one line to the next one. The distance is usually 5 metres.
A topographic map can help identify landforms if you can interpret the contour lines. Look at the contours that reflect a coastline. So thanks to the equidistance we can deduce that: When the contour lines are very close together, the ground is very sloping, but when the contour lines are very separated, the ground is very flat.
8.- THE COMPASS. PARTS AND HOW TO USE. The first thing you need to learn, are the directions. North, South, East and West. Look at the figure and learn how they are. North is the most important. 8.1 PARTS OF THE COMPASS: 8.2 HOW TO USE: First of all we must know where we are on the map ( starting point ) and where we are going ( finishing point ), otherwise it is a waste of time. 1. Align the edge of the compass with the starting and finishing point.
2. Rotate the compass housing until the orienting arrow and lines point N on the map. 3. Rotate the m a p a nd compass together until t h e r e d e n d o f t h e compass needle points north.
4. Follow the direction of travel arrow on the compass, keeping the needle aligned with the orienting arrow on the housing. IMPORTANT: - In order to know how to navigate using the Sun, the stars, the moon, plants and so on, you have to use this website.