Classroom Blog World Tour

Published by in blogs, geography, globalvoices on August 30th, 2006

I introduced some students and teachers at Greenville School today in south-central Oklahoma to the classroom blogosphere using a customized Google Earth KML file I named, the “Classroom Blog World Tour.” (This requires Google Earth.) I let students take turns “driving the mouse” on my laptop, connected to a LCD projector, while they literally “flew” us around the earth to the cities of different classroom bloggers. After “flying” to the city, students clicked the embedded link in Google Earth and viewed the classroom blog, first in a smaller Google Earth window and then full-screen in a web browser. This “world tour” currently includes 11 classrooms in North America and Australia. Yes, I know I need to include Scottish bloggers, Ewan! Which others need to be included?

I hope to eventually make this a dynamic KML file which is updated from a mySQL database of classroom blogs. For now a static file will suffice, and the kids REALLY loved this today. If you’re looking for a very engaging, “sexy” way to share a tour of classroom blogging voices spanning the globe– check this out.

I have the KML file and other KML / Google Earth related links on a new KML resources page.

On this day..

2 Comments »
  • http://edu.blogs.com Ewan McIntosh

    This is excellent – a super idea. Kids always love looking at their Clustrmaps, so taking a look at it dynamically is a step up. All Scottish edubloggers that can tend to sign up over at http://scotedublogs.wikispaces.com

    There are others who don’t, but that’s a pretty good indication. They are split up by geography (Scottish Local Authorities). A google image search brings up an explanation where all the obscure ones are.

    Thanks!

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