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Worldology.com was conceived with the objective of making history and geopolitics (the relationship and dynamic between geography and politics) more easily digestible and understandable. As one who has long been interested in this topic, I have been intrigued by the possibility of more imaginative ways to bring this field of understanding to life. This led to the idea of graphical and interactive maps to enable myself and others to more acutely visualize the evolution of nations and cultures. As the creator of Worldology.com, I have found that maps have been very useful in simplifying and deepening my understanding of historical events, along with long-standing and on-going dynamics between various nations. However, most published content about important events throughout history are not accompanied by an event-specific map. With this in mind, I envisioned an application that provided an event-specific map for key developments throughout history, along with an expanded geographical view, in order to comprehend the region-wide context. For interactivity, mouseovers were imbedded so the visitor could access more detailed information of key events, along with added graphics for further illumination. Then, you can toggle back and forth between time frames, to gain a feel of the evolution of the geopolitical landscape over time. For example, in the Europe History Interactive Map, you can click back and forth through major time periods, gaining an overview of how tribes, kingdoms, empires and nation-states fluctuated throughout time. During the Middle Ages for instance, you can simultaneously see how the Frankish Empire (Western/Central Europe), Byzantine Empire (Greece) and Rus Principalities (Russia) evolved concurrently with one another. Then, you can mouseover the information buttons to learn more. You can even switch to the "Show Borders" view in order to see modern European borders overlayed upon long-ago political entities. I hope to eventually cover the entire

This is an interesting site that shares reasons why social studies is important and how a person can effectively teach it. It also has a link to the role of values that should be expressed in social studies.

While this is not directly a lesson planning website. I think it's really important for social studies educators to understand the issues that students, teachers and schools are facing. In order to be informed and powerful in our work, we must understand the entire context.

Understanding the Issue From Different Points of View | Lesson Plan | PBS NewsHour Extra

This site provided by the Smithsonian provides teachers with lessons that help students understand how to use primary sources in historical research. It would be very useful for any upper secondary social studies teacher. 

This site was designed to provide resources for teaching landmark supreme court cases. It is orgnanized by cases or concepts. One can also find a variety of applicable activities for the classroom.

This website highlights landmark Supreme Court cases and includes short activities that can be used by teachers to help their students understand them.

Because political cartoons are somewhat of special category of primary source images, I thought it would behoove us to find a particular strategy for analyzing and interpreting them - much along the same lines as the SOAPS method but one specifically designed for political cartoons. This lesson plan, and its "Cartoon Analysis Checklist" is a start.

Thanks for this add, I can use this for my lesson plan on Chinese immigration.

The Mercatus Center at George Mason University is the world's premier university source for market-oriented ideas-bridging the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems. A university-based research center, the Mercatus Center advances knowledge about how markets work to improve people's lives by training graduate students, conducting research, and applying economics to offer solutions to society's most pressing problems. Our mission is to generate knowledge and understanding of the institutions that affect the freedom to prosper, and to find sustainable solutions that overcome the barriers preventing individuals from living free, prosperous, and peaceful lives. Founded in 1980, the Mercatus Center is located on George Mason University's Arlington campus.

Provides interactive lesson plans using visual media to aid understanding of distinct periods in U.S. history from late 1700s to early 1900s.

As another tough topic to tackle in the high school social studies classroom, this multimedia-based PBS lesson plan aims to help students grades 9-12 understand the difficulties encountered by US soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Television, internet, and many other factors have changed the way we view war and receive our veterans. The lesson plan examines the conditions faced by troops returning from not just Iraq and Afghanistan today, but also from Vietnam and World War II. Like the other collection of lesson plans I posted earlier, this is material that can be a little bit emotional, especially for students who have a family or friend connection to veterans.

This curriculum provides various lesson plans, activities, graphic organizers, resources, and a video to have students connect world events to their own lives and others in their community, in relation to understanding global terrorism.

How might teachers use this site and its materials?

An honest and (sometimes) brutal look at soldiers' lives during the Vietnam War. There is a haunting collection of war photography and an overview of the war itself. It should be noted that this site is highly biased with a Western sphere of knowledge and should be used with that understanding. Note: pictures on this site may not be used due to copyright law.

The National Constitution Center in Philidelphia has a website that has information for the general public and educators. It has lots of information that teachers could find useful in a classroom setting.

www.worldstat.com is an educational site that gives you access to updated statistics for a fact-based education in order to ensure a greater understanding of the world without prejudice and misunderstandings

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is significantly more than just a museum and it is arguably the most thorough site on the Holocaust as well as other acts of genocide. Just reviewing the website and all that it offers can take several hours. Through the education filter, teachers can find complete information on how to teach the Holocaust or other acts of genocide. For example, the site offers online lessons, teacher workshops, essential topics, teaching resources, lesson plans, activities, and a list of common student questions. USHMM site suggests 5 guidelines for teaching the Holocaust, which include defining genocide, investigating the context and dynamics that led to genocide, understanding parallels to other genocides and analyzing American and world responses. A function that I find very useful and interesting is the "Mapping Initiative" filter where one can learn how to use Google Earth to view a Darfur Layer file. This file provides comparisons of before and after views of villages impacted by the ongoing events in Darfur. There is also a section of photographs, videos, and testimonies. In addition the USHMM maintains an archive consisting of wide variety of documents including photographs and films. Lastly, if field trips are a possibility, admission is free and there is a special children's exhibit called Remember the Children: Daniel's Story.

I second this - this is a great resource for incorporating economics into the lesson plans-I really dig a lesson plan here on voter turn-out.

Following off of my lesson plan from last week, I wanted to see what kind of resources there are for the social studies teacher to introduce the discipline of anthropology in the classroom. This website, produced by the American Anthropological Association, is a treasure trove of links to other sites regarding anthropology. You could literally search for hours on this site for potential resources, divided by both region and sub-discipline.

We might be able to use this in 542 next semester when we get into the epistemologies of each social studies discipline.

Densho is an organization that is dedicated to "preserving the testimonies of Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated during WWII before their memories are extinguished." The website does offer a great deal of information and document to support this mission; however, there is much more! There is a huge archive with photographs, newspaper articles from around the country, immigration documents, proof of citizenship documents, photographs of artifacts, and videotapings of interviews with the grandchildren of the first generation of immigrants. Many of these archived documents date back to the late 1800s. There is also a filter with a timeline and a glossary that is useful in understanding the events during the period of immigration through WWII and the period of incarceration. The site is a great resources for teachers and students alike!