Blank US map to print

Start with the blank map

Hand out the blank outline map at the start of a US geography unit and ask students to label what they already know. It takes ten minutes and shows you who can find their own state, who confuses the Dakotas and who has never placed the Great Lakes. Collect the maps and keep them: the same sheet at the end of the unit shows growth better than any quiz score.

Teach with the labeled map

The labeled map names all 50 states. Alaska and Hawaii sit in insets at the lower left, the way most atlases draw them, so point out that the insets are not to scale or in place. Use it as a reference sheet in notebooks, or project it while students color regions, trace a river or mark where each state joined the Union.

A few small eastern states have their names beside them on short lines, West Virginia's name is broken over two lines, and the smallest states show their postal abbreviations, such as NH and CT. Show students how to read those before they work on their own.

Check what they learned with the quiz

With a free account you can download a numbered quiz: all 50 states with answer lines and a word bank, plus Version B with the numbers shuffled, and an answer key for each version. Give the word bank to students who need it and take it away for a final test by covering it when you copy. Hand out Version A and Version B to neighbors so they can't share answers.

Standards it supports

• C3 Framework, Geography: D2.Geo.1.3-5, constructing maps of familiar and unfamiliar places, and D2.Geo.2.3-5, using maps to explain relationships between the locations of places and regions and their environmental characteristics.
• State standards that ask students to name and locate the 50 states, often in upper elementary US studies.
• AP Human Geography, Unit 1 (Topic 1.1), as a reference map to compare with the thematic maps students read.

Printing tips

The maps are letter size with lines heavy enough to survive a photocopier. Print the landscape page at 100% scale, not "fit to page", so the lines and labels stay crisp. Every page keeps a small credit line for the map data and the eduaide.ai address, so a colleague who gets a copy can find the rest.