United States Geography Resources for Homeschool {Books and Games}
We’re traveling through the regions of the U.S. for our homeschool geography unit. I’m dividing our unit according to the songs by Kathy Troxel. We’ve used these songs for all of our geography studies (around the world) and they are effective (though annoying when they get stuck in your head, as I do believe 98% of educational songs are!). Last year we learned each region’s song. This year we’re reviewing and adding in state capitals. You guys, homeschooling is teaching me SO MUCH.
This is the first post in a series I’ll be sharing of picture books by region. I’m excited that I’ve found so many beautiful picture books that feature the natural environments of the regions and states. Stay tuned!
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General U.S. Geography Resources
For an introduction to each state, we browse through and read sections that interest us from the series that our public library has (check the 900 section). In co-op, I hand out sticky notes and ask the kids to flag pages they think the class should see. That’s a great introductory activity that gets them engaged and exploring the nonfiction texts.
At home, we pore over these books:
U.S. Geography Games for Gameschool!
We are slowly growing our gameschooling closet. It’s amazing how much kids learn through games, and equally amazing how expensive collecting them can be! We’ve borrowed several of these from friends, invested in a few, and earmarked the others for upcoming birthdays/holidays.
I also have to mention the app Stack the States (iOS; google play). Although reading is required, my second grader reads the clues to my kindergartener and they could play for HOURS if I allowed it! It’s led to some great retention particularly of the shapes of the states, which makes for fun dinner conversation (hey! my chicken nugget looks like Lousiana!).
And of course puzzles. We’ve found most of ours through yard sale sites. This is our favorite- it’s wooden (so, solid!), under the pieces the capitals are labeled for a nice capitals quiz option, and landmarks are displayed through pictures.
Across the USA Picture Books
These picture books make a nice introduction or conclusion to your geography studies (or really any time in between!) because they feature a variety of locations, whether through a road trip format or otherwise providing an overview of the country within a story:
PS. You may also be interested in my posts about world geography (here) and map skills (here)!
