Google Expeditions: Leader and Followers

Google Expeditions (Get The Scoop) enable teachers to bring students on virtual trips to places like museums, underwater, and outer space.  Read Google's Expeditions Help Page



Learning Opportunities in School (suggestions):

• Metals: "Explore a Car Factory" - relating classroom experiences to world experience
• English: "Slavery in America"- book settings
• Geography: "The Art of Yangzhou" - culture, museum, poetry
• ELL: "Field Trip to Hispanic Historic Sites in the U.S." - relating to people in our school
• Spanish: " Field Trip to Spain" - See the places speaking the language
• Math: "Nasa's Modern Figures" - STEM in the world
• Social Studies: "World War I" - Visit recreated trench system
• Business: "Girls Power to Beat Poverty in Bangladesh" - beginning own business
• Chemistry: "Hydrogen Burning" - Inside a burning hydrogen reaction and explanation
• Autos: "Subaru of Indiana Automotive" - Inside a "zero waste plant"
• Speech: Students lead tours with other students in class to practice public speaking skills

Currently there are roughly 600 expeditions!  Plenty of opportunities for use!

Things that I was impressed with while leading a group through Expeditions:

• Teacher as the leader
• Direct students to the exact places you want them to go
• Read word for word information on each item in the expedition
• See exactly where every "follower" is on your tour

Things that I was impressed with while following a leader during an Expedition:

• Student as follower
• With an arrow, I was directed toward the site of the information being explained by the leader
• Amazing real images
• Felt like I was there

Since we do not have viewers for every student in the class, we have shown students how to use their iPad to experience the expedition.  For high school students, I think the iPad isn't as good as a viewer, but good enough to experience the images and information.

I really like the "List of Available Expeditions" that someone created.  Combined with the free lesson plan presentations, and these really are a special experience for students who may never get there in reality.

The video below was created by Pioneer RESA Tech and displays both screens well.