Geography and History Education

Here are two useful sites. The first site provides a fun way to review geography. The second is designed to help K-12 teachers improve American history education. Enjoy!


I haven’t played Tetris (here and here) in a long time, so I couldn’t resist trying Statetris.

You determine how well you know the geography of a particular region by playing this Tetris-like game. You begin by choosing an area such as Africa, Brazil, Europe, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, South Carolina, the USA, or others. Then you choose the difficulty level (easy, medium, or difficult).

• easy level: labeled shape … non-rotating puzzle piece
• medium level: name only … rotating puzzle piece
• difficult level: no names … rotating puzzle piece

Shapes fall from the top and you have to navigate them into their correct locations before the shapes reach the bottom. It's fun and a good review at the same time.

This geography review tool would work well with an interactive whiteboard. Go to http://www.teachersfirst.com/single.cfm?id=9282 to read the TeachersFirst review of and suggestions for using Statetris.


The National History Education Clearinghouse is a central location for K-12 U.S. history education. This is a rich site, definitely worth using by both teachers and students.

Resource categories include: history content, best practices, teaching materials, issues and research, TAH (Teaching American History) grants, and professional development.

• History Content includes access to pre-approved history web sites and primary source archives, information about historic sites for field trips, research tools, online history lectures, web site reviews, a list of organizations with resources for teaching and learning American history, and an “ask a historian” option.
• Best Practices includes sections on using primary sources, examples of historical thinking, and examples of teaching.
• Teaching Materials includes sections on lesson plan reviews, gateway to history lesson plans, state standards, and ask a master teacher.
• Issues & Research includes sections on issue roundtable, research briefs, and special topic analysis.
• TAH Grants includes sections on the TAH project database, project spotlight, lessons learned, and the TAH listserv.
• Professional Development includes sections on membership organizations, online courses, grants & fellowships, workshops & lectures, conferences, and calendar of events.

Image: http://flickr.com/photos/mache/166940673/
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en