Map scale and geographic coordinates – measuring distance on a map

GeographyMaps & MappingAges 11–12

A hand-drawn map (river, road, village, school, lake, hill) with a latitude–longitude grid and a scale bar. Students drag two points A and B; the ruler shows the distance in centimetres on the map, and the program converts it to ground distance using the chosen scale (1:10 000 to 1:1 000 000) and reads the geographic coordinates (degrees, minutes) of both points. Change the scale to see how the same 1 cm on the map stands for a different ground distance.