Europe is a small continent packed with countries, so we split it into four regions, as the UN does. (The count of countries comes from How Many Countries?.) Northern Europe has ten: the British Isles, the Nordic countries and the three Baltic states.
Key idea
Three groups: the British Isles (the United Kingdom and Ireland), the Nordic countries (Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark) and the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania).
Why it works
Groups make a long list easy. The British Isles are two big islands in the Atlantic. Norway and Sweden share the Scandinavian Peninsula, Finland lies east of Sweden, Denmark is a small peninsula and islands north of Germany, and Iceland sits far out in the North Atlantic. The Baltic states line the east shore of the Baltic Sea.
Worked example: The Baltic states in order
Name the Baltic states from north to south.
- Estonia is the northernmost, across the sea from Finland.
- Latvia is in the middle.
- Lithuania is the southernmost, next to Poland and Belarus.
- From north to south they also go in alphabetical order: E, La, Li.
Answer: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.
Worked example: Two countries on one island
Which country does the island of Ireland hold besides Ireland?
- Most of the island is the country of Ireland.
- The northeast corner, Northern Ireland, is part of the United Kingdom.
Answer: The United Kingdom (Northern Ireland).
Common mistake
The three Baltic states are easy to mix up. Use the alphabet: from north to south, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. Also, Greenland is not a country of its own: it is a self-governing part of the Kingdom of Denmark.