The Website that I reviewed was from the Science portion of the website “How Stuff Works.” Specifically it is an interactive model and game called ‘Volcano Explorer.’ It is both extremely informative and interesting. They have a rotative model of the Earth that describes the structure of tectonic plates and global distribution of volcanoes worldwide. Additionally, they have interactive tabs that discuss the different types of volcanoes and how they work by using animations, as well as tabs to describe what the inside of a volcano looks like, in addition to an interactive description of the interior of the Earth. Each of these tabs has a bunch of sub-tabs which describe and visually animate the creation process and eruption process of these volcanoes. These are really cool learning aids. Finally, the game is probably the best part. You can actually create your own volcano. You set the viscosity and gas content of the volcano, and the animation responds by visually showing what the volcano itself would look like, what type of volcano you just created, where a comparable example can be found on Earth, and shows an animation of this style of volcano erupting.

I think that this website was both very fun and very informative. Although the interactive volcano game was just a section of the website, there were many other Earth system animations and interactive diagrams that were very cool as well. Even though it was the science tab on the “How Stuff Works” website, the vast majority of the content related to Earth Science or Physical Geography. The beauty of this website is that it combines education on a very detailed level with a fun game. Being able to visually see all of these processes, while still maintaining great detail can be a great study aid.

Here is the link to the interactive animation and game:

http://science.howstuffworks.com/nature/natural-disasters/volcano-explorer-game.htm