Welcome to the Social Studies page

 

There are some very interesting sites here. The difference between these sites and the ones on the anthropology page is generally small - I've used my own discretion to place them here instead of on the anthro page.

 

 ALA|Great Web Sites for Kids: World History,has 21 annotated web sites about history. The sites are coded for grade level appropriateness. Good stuff.

 Amnesty International, is the place to stop by if you want news of Amnesty's campaigns and activities. You can join up here too.

 Ancient Web,is an attractively designed site that I just came across. It calls itself a resource for teachers, students and others who are interested in ancient world cultures. You can find information about Chile, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Ireland, Mexico, Peru, Romania, and Spain.

 Asian Studies WWW Virtual Library, has a great set of links for students of Asian Studies.Check it out.

 Ben's Guide to US Government for Kids (6-8), is an excellent site produced by the US government which has easy to understand information on the structure and function of the US government.

 brain-juice, is the home of a number of biographies of famous 20th century people from the arts and history. The biographies are written by university students or former university students. Seems like a good research site.

 Essentials of Buddhism ,is a small site that gives you the core concepts of Buddhism. Great site for research for the students who are studying religion.

 CIA - The World Factbook, is from that world popular organization - the American CIA. Regardless of what you think about the CIA, the World Factbook is an excellent place to go for demographic data on countries around the world. I've used this site for years with students in my computer classes when they are doing research on countries. They have just updated their country data as of May, 2005

 City Mayors , is a great place to get statistics on cities around the world. If you have students doing research, or if you are doing some research yourself, on issues about cities and urbanization, take a look at this site.

 Contemporary Women World Leaders, is an excellent little site with information about women world leaders from 1945 up to the present. For those ill-informed folks who like to claim that women are hopelessly oppressed in Muslim countries, this site can be an eye opener, particularly since the US, Australia and a number of other Western democracies have never had a woman head of state. Of course, this doesn't mean that women in Muslim countries aren't oppressed. It does highlight some inconsistencies in right wing arguements about Islam, however.

 Country Profiles is a great resource from the BBC. Your students can find full profiles on history, politics and economic background of countries and territories. The files also includes audio or video clips.

 Country Studies: Area Handbook Series (Library of Congress), is the online series of books prepared by the LOC. These online books, covering 91 countries, are an excellent, if somewhat outdated (1992) source of information on the countries that are covered.

 Daily Life in Ancient Times, covers a wide range of cultures including Greece, Rome, China, Japan, and Native American cultures in the US.

 Early Music, has recordings of 2, 3, 4 and 5-part songs and instrumental selections from the 14th - 17th Centuries. You can download these songs and use them in your classroom. This is a great resource. I plan on downloading all the songs for use during our upcoming unit on the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

 Egyptian Gods , is a page with information about Egyptian gods, of course. Good for a mythology class or a project about Egypt.

 Free Rice, is a sister site of the world poverty site, Poverty.com and has this to say about itself. "FreeRice has two goals:

1. Provide English vocabulary to everyone for free.
2. Help end world hunger by providing rice to hungry people for free.

This is made possible by the sponsors who advertise on this site.

Whether you are CEO of a large corporation or a street child in a poor country, improving your vocabulary can improve your life. It is a great investment in yourself.

Perhaps even greater is the investment your donated rice makes in hungry human beings, enabling them to function and be productive. Somewhere in the world, a person is eating rice that you helped provide. Thank you."

This is a fun game for vocab freaks and you can use it with your students as well. What's better than having fun and doing something worthwhile at the same time?

 Gods, Heroes and Myths, is a cool mythology site that is excellent for students from Grade 3 up. Basic, easily understood information on Greek, Roman, Celtic, Arthurian, Egyptian, Babylonian, Norse and Native American mythology. Nicely presented as well.

 Greek People, is a site with information on Greek mythology. The articles are short, but concise. Suitable for upper elementary and middle

 Greek Mythology, is a site with information on Greek mythology. The articles are short, but concise. Suitable for upper elementary and middle school students.

 Holocaust Resources for Teachers, is an excellent site for teachers who are teaching about the Holocaust. There are many resources on this page, including biographies, music, museums, maps and galleries. Definitely check this out.

 How Far Is It?. You can find the latitude and longitude of two places and calculate the distances between them. Also includes a map with the two places on it. This is a service of Bali Online. I discovered that it is 15,714 kilometers from my sister's house in Chicago to my house in Singaraja. Fun if not totally useful.

 The Immortals, Greek Mythology , is a page with the names and descriptions of the Greek gods. A good resource to get your students started on their study of Ancient Greece. It's not always easy to keep all the gods clearly in focus. This page will help.

 Indian Heritage, is a cool little site with information about Indian art and culture. This is a good place to stop for middle school and high school students, as well as teachers.

 Mathematician of the African Diaspora, is produced by Dr. Scott Williams, a mathematician at the State University of New York at Buffalo. The goal of his site is to inform students about the role of black people in mathematics over the past 8,000 years. Recent statistics about the number of African American Ph.D.s in math and the sciences.

 Mysterious Places, is a cool site that "...seeks to give the visitor information, educational materials, and personal observations about the remains of ancient civilizations, sacred sites and unusual locations from around the world." Definitely a check it out site.

 Mythology, Legends, Folklore, and Ghosts, is an extensive list of sites about all of the above. Included are Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Native American, Korean and many more sites. Definitely a site to check for teachers and students, although with students, I'd give them some directed sites from the list to cut down on research time.

 National Council for the Social Studies, is an online resource for teachers of social studies. This is more a site for professional development than a teaching resource, but if you are a social studies teacher in an American style school, you should check

 Outpost: Human Origins, is a National Geographic website that provides an "internet bridge between scientists and explorers in the field" with all of us at home. You can take part in research that is featured by interacting with the scientists who are actually out in the field. This is fascinating stuff.

 Reach Every Child|Social Studies, is the Social Studies section of the Reach Every Child site created by Horace Mann. Check it out and let me know what you think.

 A Roman History Timeline, has a nice, compact timeline of Roman history. Good for Middle School.

 Social Science Information Gateway, is a nifty little place to get quick access to social science information. Has a good listing of social science areas. Good place to visit for research.

 Templenet: the Comprehensive Indian Temple website , is a site completely devoted to Indian temples. You can find specific information on temples around the country. Pretty impressive and worth taking a look if you have an interest in this subject.

 Turks: A Journey of a Thousand Years, 600-1600, comes from the Royal Academy of Arts.This site is based on the exhibition at the Royal Academy. You can learn about the history of the Turks from the Uighars to the Ottoman Empire. There is quite a bit of information about the Turks; this site is appropriate for Middle School through High School.

 The United Nations CyberSchoolBus:Educational Resources for Students, is a project begun by UN Publications. It has resources for students on the world's cities, pollution, a photo gallery, special projects, and a tour of the UN. Very cool stuff. The photos themselves are reason enough to pop in. Sign the guest book and get a surprise. Guess you can tell I'm not pushing the US to get out of the UN.

 The U.S. Committee for Refugees, has information about the refugee situation around the world. You can access a data base on the refugee situation within countries. Interviews with refugees are also available. There is a major displacement of people in the world today which affects all of us in some way. This is a site well worth your time.

 U.S. Census Bureau Site, contains data on population and housing, economy, geography, data access tools, latest news, etc. You can find out recent population figures.

 WonderClub.com, is home to a site that has a list of all the wonders of the world. This site provides some interesting resources for a teacher to use with his/her students.

 Worldometers - real time world statistics , is a really cool site that has all sorts of world stats - some of them like the world population are continually updated. Some of the stats that you will find here are: number of bicycles produced per year, people with no access to safe drinking water, and more.

 WSU Social Studies Education Links, contains a string of links to sites useful for social studies teachers and students. The sites are organized according to categories: Links to Professional Organizations; Links to Social Studies Listservs; Links to Other Sources of Lesson Plans and K-12 Resources; Anthropology; Economics; Geography; Government; History; Political Science; Psychology; Sociology; Arab World. I haven't had a chance to check out most of the links, but they look good. My only real complaint with this site is the same one that I have with many sites - there is no update or creation date listed so it is difficult to know how long this site has been up or when it has been updated.