LESSON 3
MAP READING
CONVENTIONAL SIGNS
Reference:
Aids:
Manual of Map Reading and Land Navigation
1.
Slide 3/1 to 3/11.
Place of Work:
2.
1:50,000 map sheet per student.
Classroom
3.
Pencil and paper per student.
Student Dress:
Administration:
Working Dress
1.
Read the Instructors Notes before the
lesson.
Equipment:
2.
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3.
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4.
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5.
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6.
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Projector and Screen
Time Allowed:
2 periods each of 40 Minutes
3-1
BEGINNING OF LESSON
STAGE
CONTENT
Revision
SLIDE 3/1
What are the four-figure references of points 1, 2 and 3?
ANSWERS:
1.
6731
2.
7630
3.
6927
What are the six-figure grid references of points 4, 5 and 6?
ANSWERS:
4.
663281
5.
738313
6.
766294
What makes a grid reference unique or unambiguous?
ANSWER: Using the hundred kilometre letters.
Aim
The aim of this lesson is to teach you some of the Conventional
Signs used on maps.
Objectives
By the end of this lesson students will be able to recognise many of the
symbols used on the map to represent features on the ground.
Reasons Why
When you can recognise Conventional Signs and understand their
meanings, you will be able to read a map and quickly relate it to the
ground.
Incentive
In operations, recognition of Conventional Signs will help you to refer
to features quickly without having to unfold your map.
3-2
MIDDLE OF LESSON
INTRODUCTION
SLIDE 3/2
Look at this air photograph of Barra and see if you can find roads,
buildings and a hill.
Here is a map covering the same area.
SLIDE 3/3
You can see that a map is a birds-eye view of the ground, drawn on
paper. It is not possible to draw all ground features exactly to scale on
the map. This is why Conventional Signs are used. Conventional signs
are a form of shorthand which conveys information to you.
GROUPS
It is difficult to remember every Conventional Sign and therefore a
legend or key is printed at the side of the map to help you.
Look at the right hand edge of your map and find the legend.
There will be a Conventional Signs test which you must pass; so it is
essential to study and remember as many of the important symbols as
possible.
This lesson does not cover every symbol, but you must know the most
important Conventional Signs. These are divided into six groups.
LINE SYMBOLS
When you look at a map for the first time your eyes are usually drawn
to the line symbols.
These are for example: roads, railways, tracks and pylons.
If you study the legend at the side of your map you will see that there
are many road, tracks and railway symbols.
Let us now look at a selection of the main line symbols.
Instructor to explain using the slides and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/4
Note: “Rights of way” may not be marked on the ground.
SLIDE 3/5
1.
Power lines can be important navigation features.
2.
Bridge symbols can also be shown with embankments, cuttings
and tunnels.
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class in identifying line symbols by giving grid references
of such features on their map, and asking the students to name them
using the legend.
3-3
BUILDING
Most buildings are either an outline or a plan of their position.
Instructor to explain using the slide and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/6
A common outline which you may know is that of a Place of Worship.
Places of Worship are important because from the top you get a good
view of the countryside, and because they are easily seen.
Note: There are three different Places of Worship symbols.
Grid references are given to the centre of the black square or circle.
Windpump or TV mast symbols have the centre of their base as the grid
reference.
Larger buildings are shown as a plan of the actual building. Important
public buildings have a thick black line around their edge.
Build-up areas are shaded because there is not enough room to show
individual buildings.
In the countryside every building, even small huts, are shown because
they are important in areas of few features.
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class in identifying buildings by giving grid references of
features on their map and asking them to name them using the legend.
TREES AND
LANDSCAPE
Apart from roads and towns, much of the colour on your map represents
different kinds of woods.
Instructor to explain using the slide and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/7
Single trees or thin rows of trees are not shown, even though they may
be important on the ground because they may block your view or
provide cover. Areas of trees less than 100 metres square are not
normally shown, unless significant - a lone clump of trees for instance.
The shape of the ground is shown by contour lines which are the brown
wavy lines all over the map. Contours are the subject of the next lesson
but, if you can imagine contours as lines joining together all the places
of the same height, then you will start to understand them.
Other physical features important to the map user are:
QUARRIES
ROCK FACES
SCREE
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class in identifying woods and rock features by giving them
grid references of features of their map, and asking them to name them
using the legend.
3-4
WATER
FEATURES
Hopefully it is not necessary to have to tell you the colour of water
features on the map. However, be careful, as motorways are also shown
in blue, so do not try to put your kayak on the road!
Instructor to explain using the slide and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/8
Have a look at the symbols which represent water, such as streams
rivers and lakes also the beach symbols with lighthouses and beacons.
Look at the difference in width between streams and rivers.
Water is particularly important because it can be both an obstacle to
military movement and a good navigation tool.
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class in identifying water features by giving grid references
of features on their map, and asking them to name them using the
legend.
HISTORY,
TOURISM AND
BOUNDARIES
From a military viewpoint, these next symbols may not appear to be
important - until you read in the newspaper about the soldiers lost on a
golf course, or soldiers taken prisoner on the wrong side of a border.
Similarly, digging a defensive position next to Stonehenge whilst on
exercise would not be looked on favourably by the Ministry of Defence,
English Heritage or the Druids!
Instructor to explain using the slide and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/9
Notice particularly the Purple National Trust boundaries. (Older maps
will have red boundaries.)
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class in identifying these symbols by giving grid references
of features on their map, and asking them to name them using the
legend.
ABBREVIATIONS
AND WORDS
At the beginning of the lesson it was said that Conventional Signs are a
form of shorthand.
This is true but where diagrams cannot be used, either words in full
(Danger area) or abbreviations (PH) are used.
Instructor to explain using the slide and the map legend.
SLIDE 3/10
Any Questions
Questions from the class.
Confirmation
Practise the class by giving grid references of abbreviations and words
which appear on their map, and asking them to use the map legend to
give the meaning.
3-5
END OF LESSON
Questions from the
Class
Questions on the whole lesson.
Test on the Whole
Lesson
Write down the ground features which the Conventional Signs on this
slide represent.
SLIDE 3/11
ANSWERS:
1.
Mixed wood.
2.
Place of Worship with a tower.
3.
Railway on an embankment.
4.
Secondary (B) road.
5.
Radio or TV mast.
Pass answer papers to the front.
Hand in stores other than the maps.
Pack Equipment
Summary
The information on a map can be better understood by knowing
Conventional Signs, which are a code for the features on a map.
A key to the Conventional Signs is usually in the legend, but to use a
map quickly you should know the main symbols.
Look Forward
In the next lesson you will continue to learn and practise the use of
Conventional Signs.
Keep your map and learn the important Conventional Signs shown
today, because in the next lesson you will be doing a variety of tests.
3-6
INSTRUCTORS NOTES
1. Two periods have been allocated to give the instructor freedom in the way in which he
presents the subject. Rather than list every Conventional Sign it is considered better for
students to be able to remember some of the important symbols in each group.
2. The instructor has the freedom to organise the detail of the two periods as he likes
remembering that the lesson is designed to be presented in the following three stages:
a.
Period 1: Introduction and Groups. b.
Private study of the legend.
c.
Period 2: Revision and Confirmation.
3.
Period 2 should consist of a series of individual and group confirmatory tests given both
with, and without, using the map legend.
4.
The lesson should be made both interesting and fun. A mixture of the following
methods of confirming the students’ knowledge of Conventional Signs could be used to
add variety.
a.
Slides of Conventional Signs.
b.
Shuffled cards of Conventional Signs.
c.
A Conventional Sign crossword.
d.
How many Conventional Signs in a particular grid square?
e.
Conventional Signs team racing. The first member runs forward to a table,
answers a question, etc.
f.
What Conventional Signs are at grid reference ...........?
5.
Note Do not ask a student to describe a symbol as it is not a test of expression. The
instructor should show the Conventional Sign and ask what it represents.
6.
Mention that maps of other countries often have Conventional Signs that are not quite
the same as M726 symbols and that these will have to be studied when necessary.
3-7