The Wall Street Journal Podcast

Know Your USA was featured in The E-Report on The Wall Street Journal Tech News Briefing on Wednesday, 17 September podcast (click to listen).

I just want to thank the guys for the mention, I really appreciate it. If you haven’t already subscribed to the podcast you can do so through iTunes, it offers a great insight into the world of technology and I highly recommend it for everyone interested in technology.

Listen to the entire Wall Street Journal Podcast

 

Audio snippet from the podcast that features Know Your USA

The E-Report podcast is co-hosted by Tom Dziubek and Paul Herrmann. It’s tacked on to the end of the Late Day Tech Briefing on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

Know Your USA 1.5 Receives CTR Editor’s Choice Seal

Know Your USA 1.5 was reviewed in the September 2008 issue of Children’s Technology Review and received the Editor’s Choice Seal.

Version 1.5 [Know Your USA], released Summer of 2008, includes more content (60 photos, better maps of each state with more details, better puzzles, and a direct link to both Google Earth and the Wikipedia entry on the United States). With these new tweaks, the program provides a straightforward and effective way to practice geography facts by way of a series of lessons and timed quizzes.

About CTR:
Children’s Technology Review (CTR) is an ad-free, subscriber-supported web and print-based publication. It is designed to keep educators, parents and librarians informed on commercial interactive media products designed for children, aged birth- to 15-years. These are the products that children use for both fun and learning, either at home and/or at school. They include software, video games, interactive toys, web sites that a child might visit, and so on. From a theoretical perspective, CTR exists in the space between child development and interactive media. The Children’s Software Finder(TM), our database of more than 8,000 reviews, has become a critical step in our core subscribers’ purchasing-making decisions. It is published on the first business day of each month.

Know Your USA – School Library Journal

Know Your USA was reviewed in the June 2008 issue of the School Library Journal magazine. The School Library Journal has a circulation of 38,000 subscribers and over 100,000 readers. The review was based on version 1.0, so many of the new great features of version 1.5 were not covered, learn more. The entire review is below, you can read it on page 81 of the magazine too.

Know Your USA: Discover the Geography of the United States. CD-ROM. Systems: Win 98 & later. Prod. by Edware.

Gr 3 Up -Here’s a fun way to test your general knowledge of the 50 states including location, capitals, major cities, rivers, mountains, lakes, and National Parks. The “Study” section provides basic information about each state such as the area, population, nickname, and other statistics. Political and physical maps are included. The major flaw is the direct link to Wikipedia when more information is desired since there is no guarantee that all the material provided on that site is reliable. In the “Teach” section, users take a quiz and if they give an incorrect response, they are first given a hint and if their response is incorrect again they are given the correct answer. In the quiz section, the player is given the state name and must click the correct state on the map. Hints are given until the state is identified correctly. This game may be accessed for free at knowyourusa.net/quiz. The “Examine” section presents a test on all the topics covered. User progress is tracked and stored in a database to monitor future progress. An additional purchase. -Lisa Hardey, Sprague High School, Salem, OR

Interested in reselling or distributing Know Your USA in North America, get in touch.

INTO Magazine – Know Your Ireland

This months INTO InTouch magazine (Issue 92 / March 2008) features a great article by Robbie O’Leary on software for the classroom. Know Your Ireland is featured and gets an excellent write up, “[Know Your Ireland] is another superb example of home-produced software that attains the highest professional standards”.

Know Your Ireland www.edware.ie
This (newly updated) program is another superb example of home-produced software that attains the highest professional standards. It incorporates a wonderfully attractive and stimulating way for pupils to learn everything there is to know about Irish geography. It is extremely comprehensive and contains great photography, web links to Wikipeia and Google Earth, but in particular, a very well designed series of games and activities to help children explore their own country. I particularly liked the feature whereby pupils are given the precise time it took them to complete and exercise, so that teachers can introduce a competitive element.

Robbie O’Leary is principal of a large Dublin school. He is well known for his involvement in ICT in education and has written and lectured widely on the subject.

You can download the entire March 2008 issue of InTouch Magazine from the INTO website, turn to page 37 of the digital version for the article.

The same article was also featured in the March 2008 issue of the IPPN Magazine Leadership+, issue 43. This is great exposure for Know Your Ireland and we greatly appreciate publicity.

The INTO InTouch primary school teacher – trade union magazine has a monthly circulation of 38,000 across the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

“deserves to be in every school in Ireland”

We got a very nice e-mail today from Robbie O’Leary regarding our newest software title, Know Your Ireland 3.0. Robbie was extremely impressed with it, “simply superb piece of software, highly professional, fully comprehensive, easy to use, engaging and interactive. It deserves to be in every school in Ireland.” Robbie O’Leary, Sacred Heart SNS, Tallaght.

Thanks for the kind words Robbie.

For further information about Know Your Ireland 3.0 please check our website, find out more.

PARADE Magazine

Know Your USA is featured in the highly popular Parade Magazine across the United States in their back-to-school technology special edition.

A new school year brings both challenges and opportunities to make learning fun. As you stock up on back-to-school basics, consider some ways that technology can help your favorite students succeed.

Master the Map
Anyone who has survived the fifth grade knows you can’t graduate until you can name the capital of North Carolina. A new software application called Know Your USA ($25) helps kids learn geography through games, tutorials, timed quizzes and even a virtual jigsaw puzzle. The program also drills students on regions, states, major cities, rivers, mountains and lakes. For ages 8-14.

EdWare in Parade Magazine Aug 2006 - Know Your USA
Parade Magazine – August 2006.

Parade is an American nationwide Sunday newspaper magazine, distributed in more than 640 newspapers in the United States. It was founded in 1941 and is owned by Advance Publications. The most widely read magazine in the U.S., Parade has a circulation of 32.5 million and a readership of nearly 60 million.

CTR: Editor’s Choice Award

Know Your USA was awarded the highly respected Editor’s Choice for the month of July by the Children’s Technology Review magazine. We our honored to receive such an award from one of the most respected educational review magazines in the world.

Review from the July issue:
It provides a straightforward and effective way to practice geography facts by way of a series of lessons and timed quizzes. For example, in the State Capitals section, students can explore the answers by simply rolling the mouse around the screen which, it turn, pops-up the name of each state’s capitol city. In the Quickfire quiz, a capital is named, and students must select the right answer. Unfortunately, the interaction is clunky–students must click “OK” to continue to the next question, which gets repetitive.

The next step is Exam, where they must type the name of the capital. Individual student progress is stored on your hard drive, providing students sign in. There is no use limit as to the number of students, making this a viable consideration for elementary or middle school classroom use.

Other topics include regions, states, state capitals, major cities, rivers, mountains and lakes. There is also a states jigsaw puzzle. If you are looking for clean, affordable geography practice, this is a good choice. Note that the developer’s previous titles include Know Your Ireland and Know Your Europe. A “Know Your Earth” is planned. You can download a seven-day trial version, and purchase a download key if you like the program.

Know Your USA was awarded 4.4 stars out of 5 stars.

Know Your USA – Editor’s Choice Award July 2006