Last month my oldest son's teacher asked me to talk to her class about mapping, and in particular, how elevation above sea level is measured. I happily accepted and prepared a talk showing some of the mapping I've done over the years, and did my best to convey to a group of 5th and 4th graders how elevation is measured.
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| My extremely enthusiastic audience (teacher Susan is on the right) |
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| How elevations were measured in the old days |
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| How mean sea level is measured |
At the end of the talk, the students asked if I would make a map for them. I promised I would and actually created two--one of the ecosystems of Belize and one showing elevation and topography.
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| Ecosystems of Belize. Click here for a full-res PDF. |
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| Topography of Belize. Click here for a full-res PDF. |
The elevation data is from a mosaic I created using
Shuttle Radar Topography Mission data. There were numerous anomalies in the data, most of which I cleaned using focal windows, but it is not perfect. The majority of the base data came from the
Biological Diversity in Belize website, including the ecosystems.
It was a fun mapping exercise and a great way to familiarize myself with our new (temporary) home!
