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Glossary term: Meridian

Description: Lines of longitude are also called meridians. The Prime Meridian is defined as 0 degrees longitude. It runs through Greenwich in London, UK and is also referred to as the Greenwich Meridian. The antemeridian is halfway around the world at 180 degrees and is the basis for the International Date Line.

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Term and definition status: This term and its definition have been approved by a research astronomer and a teacher

The OAE Multilingual Glossary is a project of the IAU Office of Astronomy for Education (OAE) in collaboration with the IAU Office of Astronomy Outreach (OAO). The terms and definitions were chosen, written and reviewed by a collective effort from the OAE, the OAE Centers and Nodes, the OAE National Astronomy Education Coordinators (NAECs) and other volunteers. You can find a full list of credits here. All glossary terms and their definitions are released under a Creative Commons CC BY-4.0 license and should be credited to "IAU OAE".

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The Quest for Longitude

The Quest for Longitude

astroEDU educational activity (links to astroEDU website)
Description: How to navigate at sea like an explorer?

License: CC-BY-4.0 Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) icons

Tags: Clocks , Geography , Coordinates , Celestial navigation , James Cook , Exploration
Age Ranges: 14-16 , 16-19
Education Level: Middle School , Secondary
Areas of Learning: Discussion Groups , Modelling , Social Research
Costs: Low Cost
Duration: 2 hours
Group Size: Group
Skills: Analysing and interpreting data , Asking questions , Communicating information , Developing and using models , Planning and carrying out investigations , Using mathematics and computational thinking