A bearing is a special measurement of an angle which is used when dealing with maps and directions.

We always measure a bearing from North, which is normally represented on a drawing by an arrow pointing upwards.

We always measure bearings clockwise. They will be between 0º and 360º, but we use three digits to write them, so 0º we write as 000º and 21º we write as 021º.

If the angle is larger than 180º it is much easier to measure the smaller angle and then subtract this from 180º to calculate the bearing.

Examples

Exercise

Let’s try questions 1 to 11 in exercise 3F on pages 51 and 52 of the textbook. Questions 4 to 7 are not copied below, as you need to use the textbook to measure these:

Below are the answers: