Google Earth is a great free technology for students and teachers in a variety of subject areas. Obviously, Google Earth is great for geography teachers, but it can also be used in history, science, and literature courses. Google Earth has been used by history teachers to have students create maps of military movements during the US Civil War. Science teachers can use Google Earth to show the range of plant and animal habitat. A very creative use of Google Earth came from a literature teacher who had students create story and character maps based on novels her students read.

Just like planning any other classroom activity, there are a number of things to consider such as objective and assessment strategies when designing a lesson incorporating Google Earth. There are also some considerations to make that are unique to using Google Earth such as organization of the “places” column and the avoidance of “map clutter.” The Google Earth Design blog has created a list of ten questions to ask about your Google Earth project.

Applications for Education
The Google Earth Design blog’s list of questions to ask about your Google Earth project is useful for teachers trying to design a lesson using Google Earth. The questions can be particularly helpful when trying to design an assessment tool for Google Earth projects. For students, the list of questions to consider is useful for self-assessment or peer-assessment of Google Earth projects.