Seven Continents, Five Oceans, and Two Hemispheres

Hi explorer, I'm Atlas! Let's get to know our amazing home planet. Earth has seven big pieces of land called continents: Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia. In between the land, water spreads out into five oceans: the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern, and Arctic. The Pacific is the biggest ocean of all! Now look at the globe. One pretend line wraps all the way around the middle of Earth, from side to side. That line is called the equator. It splits Earth into a top half and a bottom half. We call each half a hemisphere — 'hemi' just means half! The top half is the Northern Hemisphere and the bottom half is the Southern Hemisphere. There is also a second pretend line that runs from the North Pole down to the South Pole — like a seam on a ball. This is called the prime meridian. Unlike the equator, it only goes halfway around Earth (the other half, on the opposite side, is called the 180° line). The prime meridian divides Earth into the Western Hemisphere and the Eastern Hemisphere. These lines aren't painted on the real Earth. We draw them on maps to help describe where places are. Just remember: the equator goes around the middle, and the prime meridian runs from pole to pole. Let's sort some continents and oceans next!