Quin Thomas
Friday afternoon hardly seems the time to talk shop, but Quin Thomas and I did exactly that. I’ve always wanted to interview Quin and I finally talked her into it. She’s a dynamic young teacher who gets kids and gets tech. She’s one of my young mentors.
She migrated to the Room 111 Studios to enlighten us about the power of Google Maps. I’d used them a bit before our convo. I love grabbing the little yellow guy in the lower right hand corner and dropping him on a blue dot, or a blue street for a closer view.
I needed someone to give me a shove and use this fantastic tool more…Quin was just the woman for the job!
Picture this…you’re studying really cool places like Machu Picchu, Tiananmen Square, the Coliseum, the Taj Mahal, or Timbuktu. Instead of just yakking about it, or having students read about it, tell kids to hop on their Chromebooks, fly around the world, and then drop in for a close-up view from ground level.
Here’s a link to my introductory assignment I gave to my 9th-grade Geography class.
Here’s another link to the Chinese Geography Challenge I gave to World Civ kids.
I was so motivated by this idea that I downloaded the Google Street View App. I felt that our school not having a street view was a darned shame. I followed the instructions, captured a 360^ image and then uploaded the image which generated a blue dot on Google Maps for Big Walnut High School in Sunbury, Ohio. Why don’t you see if you can find it and drop down for a closer look!
Episode Template
The Problem:
It’s hard for kids to visualize that fascinating places teachers talk about.
Solution:
Send kids on a virtual journey with Google maps.
What you can do Tomorrow:
- Work through one of my docs linked above to familiarize yourself with the tool.
- Challenge students to map their commute to school.
- Create a prompt that forces kids to find and then visit some exotic locales from your curriculum.
- Challenge students to upload an image to Google Maps.
Google Maps is the way to make the fascinating places your kids study come to life!
Listen to “70-Don’t Just have Kids Read About a Place…SEND THEM THERE…Starring Quin Thomas” on Spreaker.