Study for State Exams By Putting the Facts in Context

Now that many of you are beyond the AP US History exam, we are now turning our attention to the state finals (in VA they have the unfortunate acronym of SOL).  If you want a way for your students to study, I might suggest using ContextU which is a project that I have been working on for the last couple of years.  ContextU does what all great teachers do - namely puts the content in perspective.  It has a

• 150 word description
• puts the item on a timeline
• shows it to you on a map
• connects it to other items (we call them nodes) that it has caused and effected
• shows you groups that it is part of
• has tremendous graphics

For example, here is Shays' Rebellion and the Anti-Federalists.

If your students can see the context of a fact, they will be much better able to retain it and perform better on your state exam.