Don’t Know Much About Geography?

The Whole World in Somebody's Hands

Added August 29, 2009, a note from Kerry Dexter. I will let you know if Laura starts up again with the geography site, but meanwhile, here’s another suggestion:

Did you know that Free Rice a site that uses vocabulary games to generate donations of food for the hungry, now also has locate that country and name a country’s capitol city games you can play to donate in this good cause as well? doesn’t cost anything tp play, donations are made by sponsors for each right answer. might be a fun way to add to your learning. (Kerry Dexter)

Back to original post:

No matter how much I travel and how much I read about travel, huge swaths of the world remain for me terra incognito.  You know, those lands that lie on the edges of old maps, designated by the mapmaker as the home of dragons?

My mother’s library included a great book, which I still dip into from time to time, [amazonify]0380713799::text::::Don’t Know Much About Geography[/amazonify] by Kenneth Davis. The latest edition is eight years old, and my mother’s was older still.

Despite trying,  I struggle with certain parts of the globe–particularly Africa. I have never been to Africa, and country’s borders and names have changed dozens of times since I was in school where I allegedly learned geography. (Next she will be saying the dog ate her atlas!)

Now I have an incentive to pore over the World Atlas and some web sites and fill in the blanks in my mind map.

Laura Byrne Paquet, prolific author and blogger, has started a new blog tracking her intention to learn the basics about all the countries in the United Nations in the next year. At Year of Geography you can follow along, and maybe learn something to boot.

Go Laura!!

Photo by Notice LJ, courtesy of Flickr

Vote for my article on WorldTravelist.com, sharing the best travel content on the web.

Tags: Africa, globe, Kenneth Davis, Laura Byrne Paquet, maps, Travel, whole world