Global Positioning System

Where am I?

That was a big question during mankind's early exploration of the world we live on. The early explorers found that the stars made pretty good landmarks in the sky. Using the stars, they could figure out which direction they were heading, and how far north or south of the equator they were, and how far east or west they had traveled. This system worked pretty well at night as long as the weather was good and the stars were visible. It didn't work quite so well the rest of the time ­ and this was a problem.

Well, the Global Positioning System, or GPS as it's commonly called, are like manmade stars that we can use any time, any place and in any weather to find our way around. The GPS also comes in pretty handy as their very accurate clocks can be used to study the shape of the earth as well.

In this module, we'll have a look at just what the GPS is, how it works, and how we can make use of it in our daily lives.