Location

Lesson Plan - Get It!

Audio:

When learning about geography, there are five themes you should know:

• location
• place
• human-environment interactions
• movement
• regions

The five themes of geography were created to help organize geographical concepts and make geography easier to understand.

In this lesson, you will learn about location.

• What do you already know about location?

The study of geography begins with understanding the position of places on Earth. Location is the term used to describe the position of places. Location can be described using absolute location or relative location.

Absolute location describes the exact location where a place is located.

An address or latitude and longitude lines can be used to describe the absolute location of a place.

Let's go back to Lake Michigan.

• How would describe the absolute location of Lake Michigan on the map below?

^{Image by NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory, via Flickr, is licensed under the CC BY-SA 2.0 license.}

You could describe the absolute location of Lake Michigan by citing its latitude and longitude.

The absolute location of Lake Michigan is around 43º N, 87º W. The numbers you used might be slightly different since Lake Michigan covers such a large area.

If you are uncertain how to find latitude and longitude, make sure to watch Dr. Nagler's Laboratory: Longitude and Latitude to review:

Relative location uses less-specific terms to describe the location of a place.

Relative location describes a location in relation to the places surrounding it. You will need to use directional terms such as north, south, east, west, right, and left to describe the relative location.

You could also use distance to describe how far a location is from another place when describing the relative location. For example, your house might be 1.2 miles away from the library.

• How would you describe the relative location of Lake Michigan on the map below?

You could describe the relative location of Lake Michigan by naming the states that surround it. You could also describe where it is in relation to each of those states.

Before moving forward, consider the following questions:

• Why is it important to know the difference between the absolute and relative locations?
• Is it easier to describe the absolute or relative location?
• What is an example of a time when you would need to know the absolute location?
• What is an example of a time when you would need to know the relative location?

When you are finished, move on to the Got It? section to practice identifying the absolute and relative location of different places.