Where Can Google Earth Take You and Your Students?

Google Earth may be one of our most underutilized resources available for teachers. Today's post hopes to change that a little.

Did you realize that Google Earth is much, much more than just flyover satellite imagery? It seems like each time I check it out, I discover new content and features. Today I'm featuring just one: the 360 Cities layer. Layers in Google Earth are just that--layers of content (Wikipedia entries, photos, National Geographic articles, realtime earthquake data, etc.) and information (boarders, places, labels, etc.) you can turn on or off. The 360 Cities layer allows you to "fly" into a specific location and look around with a 360 degree view from the ground. By turning on this layer you'll see where in Google Earth there are 360 Cities you can explore. They are indicated by red circles marked 360. When you double click on one of these magic red circles you'll be transported inside a 360 degree photograph. The video below gives you a brief little peak at how it works.

Google Earth 360 Cities Layer from 10Tech on Vimeo.

Want to learn more about Google Earth?
(I hope so!) Check out these resources:

• Google Earth's very own educator page
• Teaching with Google Earth from the Pedagogy in Action website (this focuses on use in the geoscience classroom, but has overview information that would be valuable to anyone.
• A LiveBinder for using Google Earth in the Classroom included tutorials and links to other resources.
• Google Lit Trips--a great resource for linking Google Earth with literature and history.
• Sign up for What a Trip! Getting Started with Google Earth in the Classroom at the 10Tech Summer Conference. 

Wondering how to get Google Earth installed on your laptop?
Google Earth is an advertised program. You can install advertised programs by following the steps explained in this demo: http://vimeo.com/9865333. NOTE: You must be at school to download and install advertised programs.

One final note about using Google Earth in the classroom:
It's a bandwidth hog. You can mitigate the possible negative effects this could have (e.g. slow response/loading times, etc.) by doing the following:

• Use an Ethernet cable, not wireless, to connect to the Internet.
• Avoid our highest Internet demand time: 11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m..
• Do what you're going to do with students before or after school (low Internet demand times) and most of the information will be cached on your laptop and Google Earth won't have to go to the Internet for it.  

Participate by exploring Google Earth a bit on your own or reading about how others are using it via the resources listed above, then come back here and tell us where you think Google Earth could take you and your students.