Oh, hi there!

Squeaks and I were doing some art projects.

We are drawing pictures of things found in space!

Look! I drew the space shuttle.

Oh, and Squeaks wants to draw our planet, the Earth, like it would look if you were in space.

What a good idea!

See, Squeaks has already drawn a circle.

That’s because our Earth is basically round.

Nice job!

That’s a great question!

Squeaks wants to know what he should draw next.

Should he draw the Fort? Or mountains and trees? Or something else?

What kinds of things would we be able to see on Earth from space?

Well, it depends on how far away from Earth we are!

Like, if you were far away — and I mean, really far away, like almost out of our solar system away, Earth wouldn’t look like anything except a blue dot.

You’re right, Squeaks, that wouldn’t be too much fun to draw!

So, let’s think of something closer.

Hey, I know!

Let’s say we were looking at the Earth from the ISS?

The International Space Station.

We can imagine what the astronauts on the space station would see.

The International Space Station is constantly moving around the Earth about 420 kilometers above the surface.

If you could drive a car straight up into space… it would probably take more than four hours to get that far.

So the astronauts are still pretty far away.

They couldn’t see their houses, for example.

Right, so you shouldn’t draw the Fort in your picture.

You wouldn’t be able to see it from space. It’s too small.

But we can see bigger things.

Like what?

Well, let’s take a look at a picture of the Earth from space to see!

So, while we can’t see buildings like the Fort… we can see bigger things.

We can see the big pieces of land called continents.

This is where we are. On the continent called North America.

There are a lot of mountains near us too.

We can see those as part of the land… they look sort of wrinkly, don’t they?

Now, Squeaks, what do you think all of that blue is that’s around the continents?

You’re right!Water.

And most of that water is ocean. Oceans are really really big.

So we can see them from space.

So you can definitely put those in your picture.

And I hope you have a good blue crayon!

Let’s look at a different photo of Earth from space.

Look at the big white spots at the top and bottom of the planet.

Any idea what that might be?

Oh, good guess!

Clouds are white. But they’re kind of scattered all over the planet.

What else do you think might be white?

Ice!

Yes. Parts of the Earth are covered with ice all year long.

Those are the parts we call the North and South Poles.

It’s always really, really cold there… so cold that liquid water freezes into solid ice.

At the North Pole, some of the ocean is frozen into ice.

And we can see the places where the ice meets the liquid water of the ocean.

There’s so much ice that we can see it from space!

You can definitely add that to your drawing.

Oh, you’re done?

Let’s see it, Squeaks!

Nice job!

I can see oceans, continents, and ice on your drawing.

Hey…do you know what?

You’ve drawn a map of Earth!

You sure have.

Maps are drawings or models that show where things are.

Your drawing is one of the whole Earth, which is big.

So it shows where big things, like continents and oceans, are found.

If we want to show where smaller things are, like the pond and the stream that are behind the Fort, we would need to make a map of a smaller area… like the neighborhood around the Fort.

That map would show where the Fort is, too!

Oh, yes!

We can definitely make our own map!

And you can too!

All you need is some paper and something to draw with.

First, decide what area you’re going to draw on your map.

Then, think about what the area would look like if you were a bird flying above.

What things would you see?

And where would these things be?

Draw them on the paper… and you have a map!

But before we get started on the map of our neighborhood… one of our viewers has a question for us.

Isaac, age 5, wants to know: How did the Earth get its tilt?

That is an amazing question!

Some maps and drawings of the Earth show that it’s tilted.

That is, it’s leaning over a bit instead of being straight up and down.

Scientists think that a very long time ago, when our solar system was still forming, a baby planet called Theia crashed right into the Earth.

Theia was so big that when it hit the Earth, it knocked it over… just a little bit.

Theia also sent a cloud of rock and dirt into space.

Over time, this rock and dirt came together to form our moon.

So thanks to Theia, we have a tilted Earth… and a pretty moon!

Okay Squeaks, let’s get drawing!

Thanks for joining us here at The Fort.

If you want to keep learning and having fun with Squeaks, me, Mister Brown and all our other friends, be sure to hit the subscribe button, and we'll see you next time on SciShow Kids!