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By Jodi Healy, Manager, Library Partnership Team
There's nothing better than a field trip for getting kids excited and curious
about a topic, no matter how "boring." Suddenly, the things they can only imagine
in the classroom become tangible, and what they learn is connected to the real
world.
Wouldn't it be great if you could take your students on a trip to the location
for every book they read – fiction or nonfiction? Imagine walking the streets
that Jack the Ripper haunted at the turn of the century, reading Where the
Red Fern Grows and exploring the Ozarks, or visiting the Great Pyramid
of Giza while you learn about the Pharaohs. Of course, most people can't take
a classroom full of kids on a world tour. But with Google Earth, you can take
them on a virtual tour – "flying" anywhere on the planet and zooming down to
street level with ease.
To help you do just that, we've pulled together four simple exercises you can
try with your students to complement books they may be reading and subjects they
may be studying: "Getting Started," "Anne Frank's House," "Rome," and "On the
Trail with Lewis and Clark." While these exercises are targeted to secondary
school teachers and librarians, they can easily be adapted for use in public
libraries.
Getting Started
- Download a free version of Google Earth here, http://earth.google.com/download-earth.html
If you are having trouble downloading the program, check to make sure your
computer has the minimum specifications
for operating the program.
- Click on the Google Earth icon to open the application. Once
it's open, try typing an address into the search box in the top left-hand
corner – for instance, the address of your school or library. Hit "search"
and watch as you fly down from space until you see the roof of your building.
- To zoom in closer or pan out, use the "+" and "-" buttons on
your keyboard or within the navigation section of the application. You
can also click and "drag" the map to fly all over town.
- If you want to learn more about Google Earth or have questions
on how to use it, please visit our support
center.
Please note that the address search currently works only for the United States
and Canada. If you want to "visit" locations outside of these countries, type
in the name of the city and country (for instance, "Paris, France"), then use
the zoom buttons to navigate from there.
Children all over the world read The Diary of Anne Frank to learn
about the Holocaust, but few have the opportunity to visit the Anne Frank Museum
in Amsterdam – the house where Anne Frank and her family hid from the Nazis.
Help your students visualize what her life may have been like by showing them
the house she lived in, her neighborhood, and the city of Amsterdam.
- After you've opened the Google Earth application, find the "Layers"
section on the bottom left-hand side of the screen.
- In the "Layers" section, click on the arrow beside "Google
Earth Community."
- In "Google Earth Community," click on the checkbox next to "History
Illustrated"
to view markers of historical landmarks.
- Next, find the search box in the top left-hand corner of the
screen and type in "Amsterdam, Netherlands."
- Watch as you "fly" to Amsterdam. Look for the high-resolution
area of Amsterdam and zoom in on this section. As you get closer, look
for a blue marker that reads "Anne
Frank Museum." (If
you don't see the marker as you fly in, try "dragging" the map up and to the
right.)
- Once you spot the marker, use the "+" button to zoom in as close
as want. You can also click and "drag" the map to explore the neighborhood.
Rome is a historically rich city, with no shortage of books exploring its history,
art, language, and people. In Google Earth, historical markers can help your
students experience Rome as though they're taking a guided tour through the city.
- After you've opened the Google Earth application, find the "Layers"
section on the bottom left-hand side of the screen.
- In the "Layers" section, click on the arrow beside "Google
Earth Community."
- In "Google Earth Community," click on the checkbox next
to "History
Illustrated"
to view markers of historical landmarks.
- Next, find the search box in the top left-hand corner of the
screen and type in "Rome, Italy."
- As you "fly" in from space, watch for the blue markers identifying
landmarks. Zoom in using the "+" button to see where Julius Caesar
was murdered, visit the Ancient Coliseum where the gladiators fought, or tour
the Pantheon, the Vatican, and the Palazzo Borghese.
In 1804, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark set out across uncharted territory
to find a water route to the Pacific for ocean commerce, discovering the
American Northwest along the way. Two hundred years later, your students can
use Google Earth to "travel" the route they took while reading about their journey
in the linked diary entries published at Discovering
Lewis & Clark.
- Click here to
open the Google Earth Community's Lewis and Clark expedition page in
your browser. Read
the description of what the application will allow you to see in Google
Earth.
- Click on "Open this Placemark." If the Google Earth program
isn't already open, open the Placemark file that appears on your desktop
– this will automatically open Google Earth. As you're directed back
to the Google Earth program, watch as the path of Lewis and Clark appears
across North America.
- Check that the Lewis and Clark expedition file appears in the "Temporary
Places" folder within the "Places" section of your left-hand navigation
bar. Within this folder are two links - "Discovering Lewis and Clark" and "Historical
Data." Click on the right-facing gray arrow to expand these folders. Within
the "Discovering Lewis and Clark" folder, you will see links to a
number of Lewis and Clark journal entries.
- Click on one of the journal entry links and then click "Read
Entry" within the white box that pops up. You can also double-click the
thumbnail icons on the map to do the same thing. If you double-click
on the same thumbnail twice, you'll zoom down for a close-up view of that spot.
- Within the "Historical Data" folder, open up the
"sites" and "path" menus and try checking and unchecking the boxes. This will
allow you to view or hide an outline of the path they took, additional points
of interest, as well as an outline of the property of the Louisiana Purchase. Within
the "Discovering Lewis and Clark" folder, you can "turn on" the links
to the journal entries. Within the "Historical Data" folder, you can
"turn on" the route Lewis and Clark took, the outline of the Louisiana Purchase
, and more.
- Don't be afraid to play with the program, turn features on and
off, and ask your students questions. Did Lewis and Clark choose the
best path? What other route could they have taken?
Other questions? Send
us a note.
Every newsletter we'll try to answer 1 or 2 of the most frequently asked questions.
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