tamugoogleearth

Using Google Earth

Google Earth is a great application for Social Studies teachers to use with their classes. It can be as simple as providing an example of the distance separating two places. It can be as complex as studying the cultural norms and history of a foreign country. You can compare the geographic terrain in two places that may be separated by thousands of miles. It gives the perspective of distance and terrain features that may isolate cultures and cause them to develop differently. Studying the geographic features of an area can give some insight into characteristics of the people and culture of a foreign country. Google Earth can also allow you to view important landmarks in an area and then give resources to research those landmarks. Look at a couple of cities and some features of Google earth. Now some of the culturally important places in New Delhi. Some temples are There are a lot of other resources that are available without searching the Internet like the Golden temple  There are also a lot of ways that you can insert content when you create Google earth placemarks.


 * Navigating in Google Earth**

Many people have used Google Earth to find their house, work location or vacation spot. Google Earth has a pretty simple navigation scheme. The first thing to use is the search field in the upper left portion of the window. Type a city and state in the **Fly to** field then click the button with a magnifying glass on it. The Google Earth viewer frame will zoom in to the place you typed.

There are some view controls in the upper right portion of the **Google Earth viewer** frame. There is a compass that tells you where North is in relation to your current view. You can click on the **N** and drag it around the circle to change the orientation of the map. There is a slider to the right of the compass. It may not be visible until you move your mouse over it, so slowly move your mouse right from the compass and and the slider will appear when the mouse moves over it. You can zoom into the viewing area more, or zoom out from that area by moving that slider up or down. There is another slider above the compass in your window. That slider will change the tilt of your view. You can keep looking straight down to the area, or tilt the map flat by dragging the slider from left to right. Many areas have a three dimensional view when you tilt the map flat.

Back on the left side of the window, there is a **Places** section. That is where you keep placemarks that you have saved. You can click the box next to a place to turn on the placemark and then double-click the name to zoom in to it. The placemark has a text bubble with information. Different placemarks will have different information. Some will have photos, web links, or perhaps even video.


 * Resources for Google Earth Activities**

A few web sites link to Google earth places. One is http://www.panoramio.com/

The Google Earth discussion group is a great resource for activities. The link is http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.php/Cat/0.


 * Adding and grouping placemarks**

You can create your own placemarks. When you have located and are viewing a site that you want to save, change the orientation to view the site the way you want and then click on Add and placemark. That will add a placemark to the site you are viewing and save the orientation as a part of the placemark. A pop up window will open that has details about the placemark. You will want to change the name to something that will remind you what the placemark is showing. In the details field, you can type a description, paste a link or even add a picture or embed video from some Internet video sites. The place mark will be added to your My Places folder.

You can also group several placemarks in one folder. Right-click on the My Places folder and choose Add, then folder. You can name the folder something that represents the entire contents of the folder. Then click on the title of your placemark and drag it to the name of the new folder. That will place the placemark on the folder. Repeat those directions for each place that you want in the folder.

There are a lot of other options that you can explore. You can create placemarks with an image layer over the Google Earth layer so that a historic map can be compared to current geographic features. Like this map of Confucius time. Or a chart can be used to illustrate growth or population in an area.

Information for advanced Google Earth activities

Google Earth 4 User guide http://earth.google.com/userguide/v4/

Adding Paper models to show 3-D buildings http://digitalurban.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-earth-paper-models.html


 * Recommendations from training classes**

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