Finding Data and Data Visualizations Online
The After Babylon project provides several different data visualizations, each providing unique insight into "living" human languages and their relationships. It would be particularly useful for teaching cultural diffusion and exchange in a world geography or history course. Features include:
- A “Languages in the World” dot distribution map displays 2,678 living languages across the globe, indicating the origin of each language.
- A dot distribution map uses different colors to show the location and distribution of languages from the same family, providing insight into how language spreads and evolved among human societies.
- Additional data visualizations provide interesting information about how widely spoken different languages are, and how words have been exchanged among cultures.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
The mission of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is to protect the health safety of the United States. Some areas they focus on are infectious diseases and conditions, healthy living, traveler’s health, and emergency preparedness. Probably most useful for teaching data literacy in social studies is the website's Data & Statistics page, which includes the following and can be used to support research projects or lessons on health and health disparities:
- Datasets for public use on topics such as deaths and mortality, injuries and violence, and smoking and tobacco use.
- Links to continually updated interactive database systems.
- Data on birth rates and death rates for states and territories.
- Extensive information on different diseases and conditions, including disparities among races and ethnicities.
Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement
Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) is a non-partisan, independent research organization focused on youth civic engagement in the United States. They conduct research on youth participation, and try to leverage their research to improve opportunities for all young people to acquire and use the skills and knowledge they need to meaningfully participate in civic life.The website features:
- Three interactive tools that allow users to explore rates of youth civic and political engagement, young people's influence on elections, and the local conditions that influence youth participation and may serve as levers to increase and improve it.
- An election center with data, analysis, and commentary on current and past elections.
- And a CIRCLE in Action page with research and data about current topics.
Centre for Global Economic History
The Centre for Global Economic History, in Utrecht, Netherlands, researches long term evolution of the world economy, including institutions, economic growth, and inequality. The CGEH has viewable ongoing and completed projects, where you can explore their goals, hypotheses, data sets, conclusions, and virtually everything that is part of the project. Projects and site features of particular interest to social studies teachers are:
- The Clio Infra project that is focused on understanding global inequality. Here, you can find data on early economies, urbanization, and population.
- The site's data page, which offers dozens of datasets that students can use to explore world historical questions and to create data visualizations with programs like Excel or Google Charts. For example, student's could use the Conflict Catalog to develop and explore questions about topics like war-related casualties over time or the number of wars occurring in the world from decade to decade.
CIA World Factbook
The CIA World Factbook provides information on the history, people and society, government, economy, energy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues. Useful features include:• Dozens of political, physical, and transportation maps that teachers can use for development of map reading skills.
• Travel Facts, which provide country-specific data such as major languages, religions, and other cultural practices, which can be used to generate graphs or annotated maps.
• One Page Summaries of every country, providing information on the Government, Geography, Economy, and People & Society.
• Spy Kids, including an aerial analysis game that uses GIS images to encourage critical thinking and problem solving.
CIA WORLD FACTBOOK ACTIVITY
Current Research in Digital History
Current Research in Digital History (CRDH) offers exemplary data-based historical arguments and interpretations for social studies teachers and students. CRDH an annual open-access, peer-reviewed publication of the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media at George Mason University with the primary purpose of encouraging and publishing scholarship in digital history. The platform for CRDH was chosen specifically to allow for publication of visualizations and graphics with accompanying narratives, as well as associated data or code. Teachers can use the scholarship from CRDH to demonstrate the role that data visualizations can play in historical inquiry and evidence-based arguments.
Current Research in Digital History Activity COMING SOON
Data USA
Data USA is a website designed to help users understand and visualize critical issues facing the United States in areas regarding jobs, skills, education, and much more. The information and data provided is a good tool to use to inform and gain valuable knowledge as a US citizen. Created by Deloitte, Datawheel, and Cesar Hidalgo, the information and data on Data USA is composed by economists, data scientists, designers, researchers, and business executives. Data USA provides public US Government data to help users conduct their own analyses and conclusions about the United States with the ultimate goal of individuals learning and understanding their country. There are numerous features on the website that can be helpful when teaching social studies. By clicking the menu option in the upper left hand corner and selecting the tab “Explore”, users can pick from a list of locations, industries, occupation, degrees, universities, and products & services. A majority of the data visualizations provided on the website gives the user the convenient option above to view the data, save the image, or to share or embed it. The Viz Builder tool on Data USA is phenomenal for creating and comparing various data visualizations. This tool gives users the option to create their own visualizations, which can be helpful when wanting to discuss a particular topic in the classroom. There are also sample Viz Builder data visualizations to choose from as well if the user would rather not create their own. To create a data visualization, simply go to the “Viz Builder” tab and select “Go directly to interface”. In addition, users can also create their own maps by clicking on the “Map” tab. The website also has a special feature on data pertaining to COVID-19 in the United States as well.
DATA USA ACTIVITY
The Fallen of World War II
The Fallen of World War II is an incredibly effective 18-minute "data documentary" that uses an animated data visualization and an interactive tool to demonstrate the extent of the casualties of World War II and the impact that the war had on the world. History teachers can use this visualization to help students grasp the devastation of the war, and to understand the realities of the statistics they might read in a textbook. In the video, students can view:
- Aggregate and disaggregated data on military and civilian deaths during the war, woven with photographic images that humanize the disturbingly high number of deaths.
- Comparisons between the casualties in WWII and those of other wars in history, including more recent ones like Iraq.
- An interactive feature that allows them to dig more deeply into the data.
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is a part of the United States Department of Homeland Security. The agency was created to establish and coordinate a response to disasters or emergencies that occur within the United States and provide resources to local and state authorities. If a state of emergency or disaster is declared, the governor of the state requests assistance from the president that FEMA steps in. FEMA will provide local and state governments with experts and funding in order to build relief for the state of emergency declared. By clicking on the “Navigation” tab on the upper left hand corner of the website, the user can scroll until they see “Data Visualization”. On this page, it will show different emergencies or disasters that occurred in certain locations in the United States. Students would be able to get a better understanding of what type of emergencies happen in certain areas and which ones may be more common than others. The data visualizations also provide insight on what years more or less emergencies happened then others and the financial budget that was used that year. FEMA is a good tool to discuss with students what happens when an emergency does happen and how they help. The website also provides current resources on what FEMA would do or have done in the past with particular disasters and emergencies. FEMA also offers story maps on particular topics so students can easily navigate and click through a simulation to learn more about the topic. FEMA ACTIVITY
Federal Reserve Economic Data
Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) is an online tool and website that offers many different data visualizations, explicitly specializing in economic data and graphs. Produced by the Federal Resource Bank of St. Louis, the website is remotely user friendly and easy to manage. Most of the content listed here pertains to economic data, which may be more suited for upper middle school or high school social studies students. FRED provides many tools for its users including looking at graphs at different time frames and creating or manipulating your own graphs. The website also lets the user download, graph, and track 708,000 US and international time series from 91 sources. The search bar can also be used to look for particular graphs or data visualizations on the website. Some of the graphs featured in the “At a Glance” tab are unemployment rate, real gross domestic product, U.S./ Euro foreign exchange rate, industrial production index, and 10-year treasury constant maturity. There are also tabs for popular graphs and data and latest releases. Under the tools tab, there is an option called “My Data Lists” where you can save information and graphs. At the top, there is also a tab called “Information Services” where other sources of information can be found. The “Publications” tab is where published works can be found. The “Working Papers” tab refers to preliminary materials circulated to stimulate discussion and critical comment. Finally, the “Economists” tab shows real economists, information about them, and what they have published.
FiveThirtyEight
FiveThirtyEight is a website that focuses on opinion poll analysis within politics, science, economics, popular culture, and sports by blogging and by written articles. The website was originally created by Nate Silver and is property of ABC News. The published articles on the website typically create or analyze statistical information or give opinions. The homepage contains the latest and most recent articles that contain relevant news. On the right side of the homepage includes interactive data visualizations for the user. Some of the current ones on there are “How Popular or Unpopular is Donald Trump?”, “How many Americans are ‘Very’ Worried About COVID-19?” and “Who is Winning The Generic Congressional Ballot?”. These visualizations will update according to what is popular on the news at the time. Depending on the type of post, the data visualizations can vary from graphs, charts, maps, and timelines. There are also podcasts and videos that the user can listen to and watch as well. This website could be helpful and could develop good conversation with students because most of the information on this website is very current and relevant to the students. One thing to be aware about when teaching to students, is that some of the articles are opinionated and may have bias towards them. It’s important to address this and have a conversation with this in class. However, the interactive data visualizations are a great tool to use!
Gapminder
Gapminder is an online tool useful for teaching world history, including investigations of contemporary global issues. Students can use the website to help them begin the inquiry process by asking questions about world issues, and they can gather, analyze, interpret, and display evidence. The website has an abundance of resources, including
- An interactive data visualization tool, which students can manipulate and use to explore different variables and different visualization styles.
- A variety of engaging informational videos.
- Datasets that students can explore and download.
- A quiz that provides data for Gapminder’s Ignorance Project, which is intended to explore the degree to which people are ignorant about statistics and the world around them.
- Slides that have been used in public presentations, as well as TED talks that can be downloaded and modified for teacher use.
- A library of teaching resources.
- A feature called DOLLAR STREET, which allows students to explore how people from poorest to richest live in different parts of the world.
Google Earth
Google Earth is a computer program that renders a 3D representation of Earth using primarily satellite imagery. It maps the Earth by superimposing satellite images, aerial photography, and GIS data onto a 3D globe, allowing users to see cities and landscapes from various angles. Google Earth is an amazing tool for social studies teachers that allows students to literally and figuratively expand their worldviews. Not only can students explore the planet from space and learn about physical and political geography, but they can also use the street view feature to see places at ground level. One exciting feature of Google Earth is Voyager, which has dozens of spatially-driven stories, including topics like the Underground Railroad, Congressional Redistricting, and Explorers. Another program from Google Earth called Engine has a timelapse feature that allows students to see how the Earth's surface or specific places have changed over the past 35 years. Engine also has case studies of changes in the Earth's surface water and forest land, or human malaria risks -- great resources for investigations of contemporary global issues.
GOOGLE EARTH ACTIVITY FOR WORLD HISTORY
GOOGLE EARTH ACTIVITY FOR U.S. HISTORY
Mapping American Social Movements
Mapping American Social Movements is a website that contains a project that produces and displays free interactive maps that show the historical geography of numerous social movements that have impacted and influenced American life and politics. Some of these movements include radical movements, civil rights movements, labor movements, and women’s movements. The project allows others to understand and identify patterns of influence and endurance among these movements. Detailed geographic data is created and developed for each movement, with more than 120 interactive maps, charts, and data tables included for users on the website. On the left hand side of the website presents many tabs on the different types of maps. The main selections highlighted in the color white include maps from the 1870’s-1930’s, Black Freedom Movements, Chicanx/ Latinx Movements, Women’s Movements, 1960’s-70’s Movements, Labor and Radical Press, and Recent Movements. Once the user has selected one of these choices, a brief description will be at the top explaining what was selected. Under the description will be interactive maps that the user can pick from to study and interact with. Each map will be slightly different, but will be in the same category that the user first selected. On some of the interactive data visualizations, there will be other versions of the data besides a map such as charts or graphs. To see the different data visualizations, the user will need to click on the blue boxes above the data visualization. A majority of them will also let the user manipulate what year is shown to get a better representation of the particular movements and their outcomes. These data visualizations could be very helpful to use in the social studies classroom when discussing powerful movements that have happened and to show how they affected the United States.
Metrocosm
Metrocosm is a collection of maps and data visualization projects, created and run by Max Galka. His goal is to make data more accessible and understandable, and “to make sense of the world through numbers.” Since data is everywhere one can possibly look, it is important to understand it and how to read and interpret it correctly. This resource has so many available data visualizations, ranging from depicting Every Plane Flight in the World Over One Year, to Visualizing America’s Middle Class Squeeze, to Annual Peak Temperatures Across the World. Whether it is to learn some random fun facts or to more deeply dive into a topic, this resource has those data visualizations. Many of Galka’s other projects are available under the “About” section. Under “Get the data,” all of the data from each data visualization is available for download to promote full transparency and access. There is a tab titled “Most Popular Today” featuring the most popular data visualizations and articles, featuring really interesting information. This would be an excellent resource to provide students with to explore data visualizations, primarily for familiarizing students with the concept, and introducing them to think critically about the effectiveness of data visualizations. Blueshift, possibly the coolest part of this site, allows for anyone to create a dynamic map in minutes, without coding – however, there are a limited number of registrations to gain access to the program, but simply by entering an email, you can be notified of more spots opening. This resource would be extremely beneficial in social studies classrooms and introductions to data visualizations.
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
National Institutes of Health (NIH) is a part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and is the nation's leading medical research agency. NIH makes important discoveries that essentially help and save multiple people's lives as their mission is to seek fundamental knowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen live, and reduce illnesses, diseases, and disability. NIH invests about $41.7 billion in medical research to improve the health of American people and has over 22,000 employees, with 6,000 being research scientists. Many of their research is conducted through their own scientific research program called Intramural Research Program (IRA). At the top, by clicking on “Institutes at NIH” it will show all of the 27 institutes and centers that NIH is made up of. To access some educational resources for students, under the “Health Information” tab and then clicking on “Science Education Resources” will bring users to resources students can use. Some of the resources on this page include small texts for the students to read, games to interact and learn with, activities, and lessons and resources for teachers to use. Two great resources for teachers to use for their students are the NIAMS Kids Pages, Environmental Health Kids’ Pages and the Heads Up: Real News About Drugs & Your Body. The Environmental Health Kids’ page is great when wanting to talk and incorporate topics such as environmental health, environmental issues, climate changes, pollution, chemicals, and more.
New York Times Teaching with Infographics
New York Times Teaching with Infographics is a page on the New York Times website that gives suggestions on how to find infographics to correlate with and complement curriculum when teaching social studies, history, or economics. They give suggestions based on what is offered on the New York Times website. The website recommends when looking for a specific curricular element to try the multimedia archive, or relevant blogs such as Economix. For learning about infographics in general, the website proposes to look at Teaching With Infographics: Places to Start. There are also suggestions on where to find current events and politics regarding certain topics. Some of these topics include government budgets and economic policies, same-sex marriage, breaking news, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are also many resources on immigration, U.S. presidential elections and presidents, gender gap, unemployment, consumer spending, and so much more. Under each category, it gives a few ideas on where to find infographics on the New York Times website. By simply clicking on the blue underlined text, it will bring the user straight to the resource linked. One thing to keep in mind is that in order to see some of the data visualizations, the latest version of the flash player must be downloaded on to the viewing device. This website can be essential to the classroom because it can give great resources for current events so teachers don’t have to spend their entire lunch period trying to find them.
Our World in Data
Our World in Data is an online resource that provides free access to 3529 charts across 297 topics. Their mission is to provide “research and data to make progress against the world’s largest problems.” Their data is used in nearly every well-known news source, from The Guardian, to the New York Times. It is used at Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, and Cambridge, as well as other institutions for educational purposes. Their articles cover a broad range of topics, from “Health” and “Food and Agriculture” to “Human Rights and Democracy” and “Violence and War.” Our World in Data strives to cover what the biased news media does not. Our World in Data focuses on reporting large, multi-century long problems or much longer and long-lasting changes that gradually reshape the world. Some of these topics include demographic change, energy and environment, poverty and economic development, living conditions and community well-being, human rights, and violence. While the media frequently decides to report on new events, Our World in Data focuses on what is important. They believe that through finding, interpreting, evaluating, and analyzing data, it is possible to change the world. This resource, because it has such a focus and determined mission, as well as so many issues that it covers, is extremely valuable for a social studies student. Every publication has multiple data visualizations that are used to communicate the complexities of data effectively. Students doing research projects, learning about data visualizations, or who are simply interested in a certain topic should find success in this easily navigated resource.
Pew Research Center
Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan resource that conducts public opinion polling, media content analysis, demographic research, and other social science research. Their mission is to inform the public about issues, attitudes, and trends in a transparent, nonbiased way. This is focused on politics and polls in the United States, containing sections on U.S. Politics, Media & News, Social Trends, Religion, Internet & Tech, Science, Hispanics, Global, and Methods. While mostly pertaining to current events, articles can be found from the past, and many of the Pew studies use historical data and polls as comparisons to today. Their Fact Tank articles are nonpartisan, informing readers on current events. Some of these current events include more information on climate change, gun policy, environment and energy, immigration, poverty, race and ethnicity, and much more. Also, there is a Global Indicators Database, taking data from their Global Attitudes Surveys. Their Global Attitudes Project has conducted nearly 600,000 interviews in 64 countries. In this database, users are able to access information on the opinions of people in other countries and can be easily accessed by question topic or country. Many articles contain helpful data visualizations that accurately portray information, give fair comparisons, and are easily readable and understandable. For social studies teachers, this resource helps users to understand current events in an unbiased way, based on real polls rather than what is commonly seen on social media or among common circles. For specifically history teachers, they can do many comparisons between polls in the past and current ones through Pew Research Center. PEW RESEARCH CENTER ACTIVITY
Population Education
Population Education is a national program that develops curriculum for students to help them understand human population trends and the impacts that these trends have on the environment. They integrate population information into natural and social science subjects, providing many classroom resources. Under the “Classroom Resources” tab, there are hundreds of lesson plans, curriculum, readings, packets, videos, tools, and more to demonstrate population and effects. Resources can be sorted by grade level, subject, topic, or resource type, for easy utilization by teachers. These are filled with many data visualizations for students to think critically about. This resource could also work to bridge the gap between subjects in secondary schools, as many lessons pertain to science and social studies. Along with classroom resources, they also have workshops for teachers, both in-person and online. These emphasize hands-on, experiential learning, pertaining to specific grade levels. They also have a store, where teachers can buy data visualization posters to display in their classrooms. This is a teacher-focused professional development resource that seems to effectively help to communicate the importance of data visualizations. They are located in Washington D.C. POPULATION EDUCATION ACTIVITY
Slave Voyages
Slave Voyages is a captivating digital memorial that allows students to explore data about the slave trade in the Americas. There is a Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, Intra-American Slave Trade Database, and African Names Database, all available to view, and are currently being worked on and added to as more information becomes available through historical research. There are also images of manuscripts, places, slaves, and vessels available in the image galleries. Special features include introductory maps of the slave trade, viewing of a slave ship in a 3D video, timelines of estimates of the number of captives embarked and disembarked, and a timelapse of movement of slave ships across the country. Many different maps concerning the slave trade are available and are simply laid out, for students of varying ages to understand. This resource allows for students and teachers to learn more about the slave trade and come to terms to the extent of slavery in the Americas. It helps users to understand the reality and tragedies of the slave trade. This entire resource is filled with data visualizations, so it is not only helpful for historical purposes but for critical thinking skills in thinking about and interpreting data visualizations. Slave Voyages could also help students to understand the immense effectiveness of data visualizations; as they use them through this site to understand history, they can understand the ease that they could digest this information through maps, charts, tables, timelines, and graphs. This resource was created and is run by Emory University’s Libraries & Information Technology. SLAVE VOYAGES ACTIVITY
Tableau Public
Tableau Public is a free resource version of Tableau that allows users to build their own interactive data visualizations, use most of their software functions, and publish them to the web. Tableau Public includes a free desktop application that allows users to download it onto their device. The website also gives the user the option to explore other users’ data visualizations that they created. By going to the “Gallery” tab at the top, users will be able to look through and use some of the interactive data visualizations that others have created. Some of the visualizations that could be helpful to discuss in the classroom include racial inequality in the United States, exonerations in America, U.S. incarceration rates, colorism in high fashion, comparing white and black communities in the U.S., garbage in the ocean, 5 decades of U.S. crime, men and women in the house of representatives, and more. When trying to create your own visualizations, Tableau Public provides great resources. By going to the tab that says “Resources” at the top, users can watch how-to videos, get sample data, and community resources.
TimeMaps
TimeMaps is a resource that consists of an interactive spatiotemporal visualization. In the Atlas feature of this tool, simply click on a continent or country. The map starts at 3500 BCE, and at the bottom there is a scrolling timeline. When scrolled over, it goes all the way to present day, and the map changes to correspond with whichever time period clicked on. As the title hints, they are presenting maps through time and time through maps. For any teacher or student wanting to understand the history of a region geographically and/or politically, this is a perfect resource that would enable this. In their Encyclopedia in which users can browse articles alphabetically or by region, and can browse major civilizations, empires, and events chronologically, through their origins, ancient, medieval, or modern periods. TimeMaps is a complete, thorough history resource that gives students an opportunity to get a full picture of the history of lands and civilizations. Focusing on World History, TimeMaps allows students to explore causation and connections between places and periods and provides background for historical events, in order to develop thorough understanding. Users can easily survey the rise and fall of all civilizations and empires, obtain historical context, make connections between geographical areas and time periods, and continue into specificities by country. Additionally, there are guides for teachers of Middle School World History, and more thorough guides for those who teach AP World History. Not only is this an amazing resource for students, but it provides support for teachers. TIMEMAPS ACTIVITY
Trading Economics
Trading Economics provides users from 196 countries with historical and current economic data. They forecast for more than 20 million economic indicators, exchange rates, stock market indexes, commodity prices, and government bond yields. This would most likely be of use for high school Economics teachers. As economics can sometimes be hard to grasp and become concrete for students, this resource can assist in making economics a more real and less obscure subject, allowing for students to expand their worldview and understanding of how the world works. For hundreds of countries, economic data is available, with live updates of stocks. There are forecasts for Commodities, Stocks, Currencies, and Bonds. While all of the data on this website is overwhelming at first, it can help students to understand what the world of economics looks like. There is also a news tab, which is constantly spitting out new headlines and economic and global news updates. Whether learning about economics for the first time or doing a project on current events, this resource is helpful for students to understand both of those topics. There is historical data which can be used to create data visualizations, and also has a generator which can choose a time frame for the visualization and can compare and contrast different countries with this generator tool. This resource would be extremely helpful for students who are learning about macroeconomics and those who are interested in going into a career in economics.
UNdata
UNdata is a data service that provides international statistical databases for public use. They cover topics like “agriculture, crime, communication, development assistance, education, energy, environment, finance, gender, health, labor market, manufacturing, national accounts, population and migration, science and technology, tourism, transport, and trade.” UN data also provides specialized databases, popular statistical tables, and statistical profiles of countries and regions. This resource exists to educate users about the importance of statistics in policy and decision making. Run by the United Nations Statistics Division, this resource would help students (and teachers) learn about statistics and could assist with an evidence-based project. Information, statistics, and data are available for nearly every topic. This would allow students to expand their worldviews and perspectives as they gain knowledge of the world historically, geographically, politically, and economically.
United States Census Bureau
United States Census Bureau is an agency of the United States Federal Statistical System which is responsible for producing and providing information and data regarding the American people and the United States economy. The Census Bureau is a part of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Their mission is to perform in the U.S. Census of the United State population every 10 years to get an accurate account for the population. The information and data that is provided and collected by the U.S. Census helps determine many factors and decisions such as where to place schools, transportation infrastructure, police and fire departments, and hospitals. The U.S. Census numbers and data also help determine the number of congressional seats and Electoral College votes each state gets. On the homepage of the website, scrolling towards the bottom is a section labeled “Popular Visualizations”. Infographics & Visualizations are available all the way to 2014 to currently, which can be downloaded onto a device. There is also an “Census Interactive Gallery” page available that provides several maps that students could easily manage and click through. Another feature that students may enjoy to uncover is the population clock feature on the homepage. When clicking on it, the visualization will display both the U.S. Population and World Population. There are also other annual population estimates such as the United States Population Growth by Region, the United States population by age and sex, and the most populous and highest density states, countries, and cities. U.S. CENSUS BUREAU ACTIVITY
USA Facts
USA Facts is a website that provides free public service and information about the American population, government finances, and the overall government’s impact on society. USA Facts mission is to provide comprehensive and understandable data for their users to use and easily understand and plans to continue to maintain and expand in the future. USA facts partners with many academic institutions and experts such as Penn Wharton Budget Model and Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) which assists in keeping data accurate and unbiased. They also provide plain language with supportive data visualizations that can help determine common trends such as US spending, revenue, population and demographics, and policy outcomes. USA Facts also produces many annual reports to snapshot American life and conducts a yearly poll to see how Americans interact and interpret the facts themselves. By scrolling down on the homepage, users can find a “Explore the Data” section that provides data and topics on government finances, security & safety, economy, and people & society. When viewing these data visualizations, the website gives the user the opportunity to download the data onto their device which can be saved and easily distubed and shared among students in the classroom. In addition to downloading, USA Facts also lets users share the data that they find on the website. A majority of the data visualizations also let users see the data in different formats such as a line graph or chart. When clicking on the “Reports” tab at the top of the website, users will be able to view interactive visualizations as well. Some of the current visualizations that are under the “Reports” tab include “COVID 19 Map by County and State”, “National & State Historic Unemployment Claims”, “The Economy: 15 years in 15 seconds” and “Democracy Demographics: A Look At Each State”. Many of these data visualizations are very straight forward, which makes them great to show students in the classroom in order for them to get the bigger picture of each topic or issue and create discussion. USA FACTS ACTIVITY
US Department of Transportation Map Gallery
US Department of Transportation Map Gallery is a collection of maps that were published by the Office of Spatial Analysis and Visualization. The maps on the website highlight many of the different types of transportation that have occurred through the United States over the last several years in history. Some examples of maps provided on the website include “State Laws on Distracted Driving Ban on Hand-Held Devices and Texting While Driving”, “Population Change by County: 2010-2014” , “Persons Traveling Into the United States at Land Border Crossings and International Airports: 2015”, and “Top 25 Water Ports by Containerized Cargo: 2015”. As this map gallery includes many more types of transportation maps, it can generate many different topics of conversation and discussions among the topic of transportation and immigration. In addition to maps, the website also includes a direct link at the top named “BTS” which leads users to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS). Here, there are many charts and tables full of data to analyze and observe. Data sets can also be saved and downloaded onto a device that the user chooses, making the data easily accessible for later use. When clicking on the “Geospatial Home” tab at the top of the homepage and then clicking on “Applications”, users will be able to use BTS mapping applications to visualize and analyze geospatial data and have access to tools to make their own custom maps. When creating your own map, some of the features that the website lets their users use are adding data, adding drawings, adding measurements, adding or changing the basemap, and swiping certain sections of the map. USDOT MAP GALLERY ACTIVITY
Visualizing Economics
Visualizing Economics is a website designed by Catherine Mulbrandon who combines her expertise in economic and financial data to create and publish information graphics. Her speciality includes presenting complex data through information graphics or interactive tools in order to help people get a better understanding of what the data means and is representing. She has a lot of experience as she has earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Chicago, has a master’s degree in design from Carnegie Mellon University, and has explicitly worked in the finance industry for 10 years. In order to get an idea of the type of projects she has done, she has featured posts and recent posts on her homepage for her users to observe her past projects she has completed. When scrolling to the bottom of her homepage, she has examples of some of the common themes that she has done. Some of these topics include income, taxes, world history, gold, stocks, inflation, and housing. In order to view these, simply click on the box with the topic in it. After doing this, it will bring the user to a list of the previous visualizations that she has done in the past. With her experience, she also offers to make and create information graphics with data supplied to her. If interested in creating a visualization for your classroom, she would be able to make that happen. She can create information graphics such as static images for print or web, which would provide insight into the meaning of your data supplied to her. If interested in getting in contact with her, she suggests to email her at catherine@visualizingeconomics.com or use her contact form.
World-Historical Dataverse Project
This World-Historical Dataverse Project, run by the University of Pittsburgh, attempts to address the need for global historical data. This data, focusing on social science, health, and the environment, goes back for the past four or five centuries, allowing for historical knowledge to be expanded and can be used to test hypotheses about short- and long-term social changes at the global level. This resource provides data, access to their Feature Research Projects, and access to other databases. Additionally, on the right side, there is access to the World History Center, the Department of History, the University Center for International Studies, and Global Studies – Exploring Critical World Issues. They also provide access to their working papers. Students who are exploring historical data, whether for a project or because of interest, can learn about historical data and its importance. This Dataverse was to improve interest and accomplishments in Global Studies, which can inspire students to become interested in this topic and pursue it as a career to create a better world.
World Bank
The World Bank provides loans, credits, and grants to developing countries. Their goal is to decrease extreme global poverty to less than 3% in 2030 and promote shared prosperity by fostering income growth of the bottom 40% of every country. While the World Bank is well known for its financial assistance to many countries, they also give advice, provide research and analysis, and technical assistance to developing countries. As the World Bank’s mission is to decrease poverty, they have many data visualizations on their website to effectively communicate their discovered data. They have many current events and news articles posted, ranging from Global Economic Prospects, to the Pandemic, to Biodiversity on the home page. If students are passionate about change in the world, particularly in helping developing countries become more prosperous, they could use this resource to learn about how to help them, and possibly find a career in the work. While this is more of a current events resource than a historical one, many issues pertaining to social studies are prevalent with the World Bank.
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization (WHO) is an agency of the United Nations which is responsible for guiding international public health. Some of the essential areas of their work include working with health systems, health through the life-course, non communicable and communicable diseases, and surveilling, preparing and responding. WHO also supports countries as they coordinate efforts of governments and partners. They attain health objectives by following health policies, standards, and strategies. WHO tries to coordinate international health work through collaboration, as they have more than 7000 people working in 150 county offices, in six regional offices, and in their headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. WHO has also played a role in many health achievements, including the development of the Ebola vaccine, and the eradication of both polio and smallpox. On the home page, there is a COVID-19 situation dashboard that students would be able to interact with to find trends of the virus on a daily basis. On the “Data” tab, there is a selection called “World Health Statistics 2020” that gives an overall visual summary of many health topics. Students would be able to identify big picture issues that are happening regarding health. Another helpful tool is under the “Data” tab and then clicking on “World Health Data Platform”. There are more data stories that students can watch. The Global Health Observatory page also has many data visualizations available to students. Scrolling to the bottom, students can discover and interact with data related to some topics such as child health, immunization, global influenza virological surveillance, noncommunicable diseases, tobacco control, and mortality and global health estimates, to name a few. Another great resource on the website is the Map Gallery. This feature includes an extensive list of maps related to many health topics for students to observe.