The latest from dougbelshaw.com/blog
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- Things I Learned This Week – #10
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- Ten big questions for education
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20 Ideas: Using Google Earth to develop spatial/locational awareness
16 CommentsI love Google Earth (GE). Whether it’s creating a virtual tour or an overlay of an historical event, or working out how far I’ve travelled on my bike, it’s a great visual resource. Developing a sense of place isn’t just something which should be left to the Geography department; it’s important to make things ‘come alive’ for students by coming at it from different angles, so to speak. Here’s a brief guide to get you going using GE… :p
GE can be used as a main whole-class activity with an interactive whiteboard, etc. but I think that it’s probably actually better used as a quick reference tool and visual resource. This, of course, means that you have to be comfortable navigating around it quickly. Here’s some suggestions to get up-to-speed. You should also read my post Using Google Earth in the Classroom as well as Google Earth Tips & Tricks.
1. Save your school building or educational institution as a ‘placemark’. Simply zoom to where you want to be and then go to Add/Placemark. Give it a memorable name. Later on you may find organizing placemarks by folder useful!
2. Learn handy keyboard shortcuts to save you time:
- R – aligns the earth back to north pointing towards the top of the screen.
- P – zooms out from where you are to see the whole earth and then back in again, automatically!
- +/- – zoom in/out
- F11 – go fullscreen (Windows only)
- F10 – play prepared tour
For an extensive list of keyboard shortcuts, try here! :s
3. Use the measuring tool to get across an idea of scale or distance to students. Access this by going to Tools/Ruler (you can also measure a multi-point journey by clicking on the Path button when the Ruler box pops up)
4. Use overlays to emphasize a teaching point. OK, to begin with they’re a bit fiddly but once you’ve got the hang of it they become easier to do – and you can save them for future use. To insert an image go to Add/Image Overlay. I’ve created some, including this one of the range of missiles during the Cuban Missile Crisis:
5. Make your students give something back by adding something to Google Earth Community. It’s as easy as right-clicking on the placemark/flyover folder/image overlay you want to share and going to Share/Post
For example, some photos I’ve taken of the area in which I live are featured:
So have a go and experiment at break, lunchtime or after school! Get familiar with GE so you can use it in your teaching. If you’re a History teacher have a look and contribute to the relevant section on the historyshareforum. If it’s pre-prepared lessons using GE you’re after, have a look at GELessons.com! :D
Published on September 19, 2006 · Filed under: Uncategorized;
16 Responses to “20 Ideas: Using Google Earth to develop spatial/locational awareness”
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lgenna said on September 26th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
Do you have any ideas about using this technique to help students with ADD? Thanks! Laura
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That is a cool idea!!!
I am recently working with google earth using my own site…thus need some short of articles to use my site…thanks for this one… -
H mm quite a nice information……………….
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