Google Earth Project Reflection

Prompt:

• Talk about the instructional goals of your virtual field trip and comment on how your project provides students the opportunity to develop their respectful and ethical minds.

Click here to get to the Virtual Field Trip:
http://mrschutt.wikispaces.com/Virtua+Field+Trips

This virtual field trip is entitled, “Caring for OUR Fresh Water”. It is designed to demonstrate to third graders the various uses of fresh water, the importance of fresh water, and why we should nurture and care for fresh water. Along these lines, the trip exposes students to a variety of topics impacting the Five Themes of Geography.

First, students are constantly reminded of their location, the absolute and relative position of a place on Earth’s surface. They navigate the various Google Earth Placemarks as they venture from location to location.

Second, the students learn about place as they navigate around the United States. They further explore our country and build knowledge of the physical and human characteristics that define and distinguish a place.

Along this process the students also begin to recognize how an area displays unity in terms of physical and human characteristics; a third theme of geography called regions. One example of this is the continuation of learning about landforms; a previously taught concept.

Students also learn about movement, how people, ideas and materials move between and among locations, as they view the ways water is used in transportation.

Finally, students are exposed to the ways in which humans modify and adapt to natural settings; known at human-environment interaction.

It is the goal of this project to specifically sharpen students’ abilities to recognize the impact that humans have on their environment. Through this theme of geography, this virtual field trip aims to further develop students’ Respectful and Ethical Minds as proposed by Howard Gardner.

There are three specific targets that educators refer to when teaching respect. They are respect to ourselves, respect to others, and respect to the environment. Obviously, this trip explicitly focuses on respecting fresh water within our environment. In addition, the trip helps students realize the diverse uses of fresh water within the United States. By capitalizing the word “our” in the title, students feel a sense of ownership.

The trip also allows for educators to develop students Ethical Minds by expressing more specific ways that humans adapt to survive within each environment. This allows students to better understand others’ point of view through their needs for survival. Demonstrating others’ point of view accomplishes the same ethical mission that Howard Gardner proposes,

“As disciplined learners it is our job to understand the world. But if we are to be ethical human beings, it is equally our job to use that understanding to improve the quality of life and living…” (142).

Overall, this virtual field trip enables students to learn at their own pace through the use of educational technologies in order to better develop their Respectful and Ethical Minds.