Oh, for the record? I think most people in the US learn the states in elementary school. I went to a really f-d up religious school for those years and we never had to memorize the locations of the states (or know the capitals, or learn the presidents’ names, etc)–but we did have to memorize lots of chunks of the Bible! I still get kind of mad when I think about it.
I get the states in the middle of the country mixed up all the time-- Like I know roughly where Iowa is, and while I wouldn’t bet money on which exact state it is, I’d be able to narrow it down to 2 or 3 with confidence. I’m like that with most of the midwest/north. For example, which one is Wyoming and which one is Montana? I know which two they are, but not which is which between the two.
I always used to get NH and VT mixed up, but i visited those states for the first time recently, and now have a very clear idea of which is which.
I got a perfect score.
I’m completely confident all around the coasts and the Canadian border, and with all the small, funny-looking states in the east.
The ones i really have to think about are the states in the middle that have no peculiar shape, like Kansas and Wyoming. With a few of them, it’s sort of a process of elimination. “No, that’s Oklahoma because it borders Texas. That one’s South Dakota, because it’s right under North Dakota. I know that Nebraska and Kansas border each other (The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 reminds me of that), and that Kansas is the southernmost of the two. So THAT one there must be Iowa.”
Can i just add that i’m always amused when tests like this give 3 points for an answer that you can only get right or wrong. It’s not like they need a scale greater than 1 to measure a correct answer. Why not just make it 50 out of 50?
Maybe they should try for a more complex scoring system to take advantage of the points. “Well, no, that’s NH, but everyone knows that NH looks like VT, and they’re right next to each other, so you get 2 out of 3.” Or “Oops, that’s Utah. But those square states in the southwest are so confusing we’ll give you 1 for effort.”
You get more than one try. If you get a state on the first try, you get 3 points; two tries, 2 points; three tries, 1 point. That’s how people ended up with scores that are not multiples of three.