Explore the Americas: Two Continents, One Giant Land

Look at a globe or world map. Can you spot the two enormous landmasses on the left-hand side? They stretch all the way from icy cold lands near the North Pole down to the freezing tip near the South Pole. These two giant pieces of land are called the Americas. Together they cover about a quarter of all the land on Earth! Here is a question to get you thinking before we start.

The Americas are made up of two continents: North America and South America. A continent is one of the seven very large areas of land on Earth. North America sits in the northern half of our planet. Some of its most well-known countries are Canada, the United States of America (USA), and Mexico. Canada is the second largest country in the whole world by area. The USA is home to about 330 million people. Mexico sits between the USA and the smaller countries of Central America. The Rocky Mountains are a long chain of mountains running down the western side of North America. They are some of the highest peaks on the continent. The Mississippi River is one of the longest rivers in North America, flowing south through the USA into the Gulf of Mexico. North America and South America are joined together by a narrow strip of land called Central America and the Isthmus of Panama. An isthmus is a thin piece of land that connects two larger landmasses. This means you really could travel by land all the way from Canada to South America! South America sits mainly in the southern half of our planet. Brazil is the largest country in South America and the fifth largest in the world. Argentina, Colombia, and Peru are other major countries there. The Amazon River flows across South America and is the largest river in the world by the amount of water it carries. Around it lies the Amazon Rainforest, the biggest tropical rainforest on Earth. A tropical rainforest is a thick, warm, rainy forest near the Equator. The Andes Mountains run along the western edge of South America and are the longest mountain range above sea level in the world. The Equator — the imaginary line around the middle of the Earth — passes through parts of South America, which is why much of it is hot and wet.