Looking for a fun, free, interactive geography tool for your students? Check out Google’s “smarty pins!” This game combines trivia questions from a variety of genres with geography skills, encouraging players to not only know the answer to a question, but to also know where an event occurred.
This game works well on many platforms. I’ve tried the Chrome and iOS versions with great success. The only complaint I have is that while playing the game on my iPhone, it was difficult to pinpoint the exact location to answer a question. For example, one question asked for the birthplace of democracy, which we know is Athens, Greece. As I tried to enlarge the Mediterranean region so I could hone in on Greece, and eventually Athens, I found that I was unable to select the exact location of Athens. However, I’m sure this could be remedied by using a stylus.
Trivia questions that come with this game are so varied that I don’t think I’ll be able to use them as a specific assignment or review activity. This game will most likely be something I use for a bonus opportunity or to provide students with something fun, engaging, and CONSTRUCTIVE to work on if they are finished with a specific assignment/activity.
I hope you check out Google’s Smarty Pins! Let me know what you think!
Thanks for reading 🙂
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