I recently discovered a great new way to use Google Earth in the classroom....Google Tours! A Google Tour is a series or collection of placemarks streamed together like a tour and saved as a file. You can create tours on a variety of topics and places. My students are currently planning a dream vacation anywhere on Earth! Their vacation must include 10 placemarks or "stops" that includes a short description, web link, and/or photo for each stop. I am also excited to know that the newest version of Google Earth also allows for audio narration, so that music or voices can be added to the background. This is something I plan on experimenting with in my 8th grade classes.
Google Tours can be integrated into a variety of content areas as well. Students could create Google Tours on the setting of a particular book in a Language Arts class or traking battles of a war in a Social Studies class. Below are some websites that I have found particularily useful when getting started with Google Tours. I hope this inspires you to check it out for yourself!
