Instructify

BY NICK YINGLING

One of my fondest memories growing up was this time when my friends and I found an old treasure map. We eventually ran afoul of a family of gangsters, but my one heavyset buddy was able to befriend the deformed son of the head gangster, Mama Fratelli. Just as the gangsters caught up with us, Chunk and his new friend, Sloth, were able to swoop in and save the day. We were, truly, a bunch of Goonies. No, wait—there I go again, confusing myself with Corey Feldman.

That image you get in your mind when you imagine treasure maps isn’t just fascinating because of the promise of riches. That classic example of some old, yellow, frayed-at-the-edges map also maybe has some crazy artwork of an agitated seabeast where there be dragons or something. You can just feel the wonder of exploration resonating from old-world cartography.

The David Rumsey Historical Map Collection has been busy scanning these old maps and making them available free-of-charge in digital high-resolution images. (more…)

BY NICK YINGLING

According to the plot summary for Teen Wolf on Wikipedia, “High school student Scott Howard is seventeen years old, sick of being average and wishing he were special… Scott keeps undergoing changes and eventually undergoes a complete change and becomes a wolf… During the final basketball game, Scott refuses to “wolf out” and insists on winning the game on his own.”

Isn’t that heart-warming? The message is just be yourself!

So, what does Teen Wolf have to do with anything here? (more…)

BY BILL FERRIS

Set course for Wikipedia! Facebook ahoy! And so on. These quaint nautical terms arose from a time when people depended on maps and charts much more crude than the Mapquest and GPS-enabled phones to which we’ve grown accustomed. The internet, a mistress as untamable as the seven seas of yore, is the subject of the Internet Mapping Project, a modern-day cartographic endeavor commissioned by Kevin Kelly, author of the Cool Tools blog and lots of other ‘net niftiness. Kelly has called for amateur Rand McNallys everywhere to “Please draw a map of the internet, as you see it. Indicate your ‘home.’”

(more…)

We here at Instructify love to hear from you. Would you like to leave some feedback on this posting or just send me a message? Simple: just go up on your roof and paint your remarks in big, block letters. If you’re in a rural area, you might arrange some rocks in a field. Then in the comments section under each posting simply send us the coordinates.

Yeah, I suppose maybe you could leave the actual comments in the comments section, Captain Buzzkill. I’m just trying to get you motivated about different ways that you might possibly use Google Earth.

Maybe you might be interested in using Google Earth to explore the Civil War, look at the global diamond trade, or engage students in math and geometry by looking at different mountains’ ski slopes. Take a look at these lesson plans for Google Earth, for example. You’ll find lessons spread out across five content areas: social studies, math, science, language arts, and cross curricular. The lessons start at basic how-tos for users (which aren’t just for stinking newbies — experienced users might even find new features to investigate), then branch out into both student-controlled and teacher-controlled lessons.

The best part is that these lesson plans are already prepared for you. The file formats will vary, but now you don’t have to stay up until 1 a.m. doing prep work and planning. Who knows? This new abundance of time might afford you the chance to start a new hobby…like arranging cryptic messages for satellites to read. I’m just saying. -NICK YINGLING

Lesson Plans for Google Earth

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Many, many changes have taken place in the world since we last visited Google Earth. I don’t mean changes in the outside world. No, that’s a terrible place! I mean the world you can explore inside of the latest update for Google Earth.

Google Earth 5 has a bunch of new content for you to use in the classroom. In fact, there are too many new features for me to break down in a short amount of time. So here is a quick spotlight on them.

1. First, as always, set aside five minutes for your students to locate their own house. It is inevitable.
2. See how places have changed thanks to more historical image content. Not only is it cool to watch buildings grow and towns expand, but this is also useful for lessons on the environment. Check out urban sprawl, tropical deforestation in the rain forests and the melting of ice caps.
3. The Earthquake layer is very cool. Every site is linked to info about the magnitude, depth and date of the earthquake. Zoom way out and it pretty much paints a picture of where the tectonic plates are all fussing and feuding.
4. The Touring feature allows users to create and share narrated tours as they move around in Google Earth. I’m not quite sold on this one, personally. Then again, people have described me as being a spleen. But let’s be honest—even the best tour is still a tour. Google Earth is most fun when you go off the beaten path and explore.
5. Google Mars 3D allows you to check out high-res images and terrain of the angry red planet. I’ve just spent 20 minutes bumping around Cydonia looking for the Face on Mars. The first person to provide me some coordinates wins a chance to hear me discuss the 2000 sci-fi movie Mission to Mars.
6. One of the biggest and most publicized additions to Google Earth is all of the ocean-related content. With numerous content layers from scientists and researchers, you can now explore the other 70 percent of our planet. Check out the Mariana Trench and a bunch of shipwrecks.

The classroom uses for Google Earth are plentiful, so I don’t think you’ll run into problems working it into a lesson or two. -NICK YINGLING

UPDATE — They found the lost city of Atlantis! But then the Illuminati were quick to discredit that. Hm, weird… My coffee tastes like almonds now. That’s strange…adgrgfd….

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I don’t envy you geography teachers. Ever since Pangaea split apart over 100 million years ago you’ve been stuck dealing with the same seven shapes. Sure, every once in a while a landmass changes names because of a change in ownership, but you have to admit that an awful lot of maps look the same.

Not so with SHOW/WORLD, which bills itself as “a new way to look at the world.” The premise is simple; you select a topic, such as population or CO2 emissions, and the traditional map transforms into a new map based on the data for that topic. For example, China appears larger on the population map, as it represents 19 percent of the world’s total population. The United States looks enormous on the armed forces spending map, as it accounts for 45 percent of what the world invests in the military. Topics range from education to energy, technology to tourism, and many other points in between.

While it’s true that this site is quite similar to Worldmapper, SHOW/WORLD has more to offer. In addition to maps that are re-sized in relation to a given topic, SHOW/WORLD provides percentages and overall rankings for individual countries compared to the rest of the world. There’s also a space for recommended reading, as well as a comments section. In short, SHOW/WORLD is a great resource for geography teachers searching for new variations on the same old world map. -JIMI RADABAUGH

SHOW/WORLD

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By now, I assume that many of your students are interested in an upcoming event involving two major political parties and several men named Joe (Biden, Six-Pack, The Plumber). I also gather that this country called America is divided into 50 territories, known as “states.” It would appear that these “states” have something to do with determining the outcome of next week’s big event, which is why USDemocrazy.net is so extraordinarily useful.

Developed by the political cartoonist for The Economist and students at the University of Maryland, USDemocrazy.net provides an informative and entertaining look at state politics. The main page of the site is a humorous map of the United States, displaying amusing, alternate names for each state. For example, Wisconsin is called “Cheesehead,” California is renamed “Dude,” and our great state of North Carolina is referred to as “North Barbecue.” Clicking on a particular state will reveal relevant state facts, such as the percentage of votes cast for or against George W. Bush in the prior two elections, famous and infamous natives, as well as the state’s overall political climate. Each state is also rated on a scale of one to five for political craziness.

Whether shedding more light on the intricacies of the Electoral College or highlighting distinctions among neighbors, USDemocrazy.net is a valuable resource for teachers. And even if you’re not crazy about the American political process, it would be foolish to ignore a site as witty and unique as USDemocrazy.net. –JIMI RADABAUGH

USDemocrazy.net

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The problem with crystal balls is that it’s really hard to see the future in them unless you’re a wizard, fortune teller, or some other type of prophecy professional. If only the future were clearly laid out for us on a digital, interactive map…

Non-clairvoyant teachers rejoice!
The Map of Future Forces Affecting Education provides a fascinating look into the next decade of public education in the United States. The map allows you to navigate through an assortment of color-coded boxes, each representing a particular social trend or dilemma. Clicking on any box will provide a short description of the trend along with the option to “dive deeper into this trend.” At this point, a more detailed explanation of the issue is given, along with related videos and the opportunity to join the discussion by leaving a comment. I highly recommend watching the videos, as they present each topic in a way that is both straightforward and engaging.

It is a compliment to the folks at the Knowledgeworks Foundation that this site asks more questions than it answers. Rather than plotting a direct course, this map will point teachers down a multi-layered road, encouraging new ideas to address tomorrow’s problems. So now if you’d like to know where education in this country is headed, all you have to do is look at a map. –JIMI RADABAUGH

The Map of Future Forces Affecting Education

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When I think “maps in the classroom,” I think: struggling with spring-loads, explaining out-dated political boundaries, and approximating locations off the map by pointing to a blank spot on the wall. It doesn’t have to be that way. Instructify has already written up a number of great websites (see related stuff below!) for changing the way you use maps in your classroom, and now we’ve got one more to add to the list: Wanderlust, brought to you by GOOD Magazine.

Wanderlust is an interactive graphic that allows you to take a gander at a number of famous paths. You’ll find factual routes (like Amelia Earhart’s second attempt to circumnavigate the globe) and fictitious routes (like Jules Verne’s A Journey to the Center of the Earth) and routes that are somewhere in between (like the Pan-Am Highway). Each of these historic journeys is plotted with points of interest, although, don’t expect too much content — it’s just a graphic after all. Wanderlust would be an ideal device to spice up a presentation. -MARIELLE PRINCE

Wanderlust

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Have you ever tried to have every computer in your class, or better yet, every computer in your lab go to Google Earth at the very same time? If you haven’t, don’t because those of us who have done this, have often earned the unending enmity of our school/district tech support. This is because there is no surer way to bring a network to its knees than running Google Earth, especially multiple copies from one site or node on a network. After many cookies, and cheerful smiles, you may repair that relationship with your network administrator. But how do you use Google Earth (a really wow tool) without causing a Google Earthquake on your network?

Your first option is to “cache” some of the big image files used in Google Earth. A less time and technically intensive solution is available though. Google Maps is starting to get a lot of the functionality of Google Earth, with less memory and bandwidth. Recent upgrades will let you add placemarks, and images to a map, and to save and share that information on maps. There are some “basic” overlays of photos and Wikipedia entries that can be added, and views include a satellite option. You can even export KML files to Google Earth. People are starting to do Google Lit Trips on Maps.

Don’t let “poor” memory keep you from using Google to teach geography in your class or lab, just use Google Maps instead. -ALICE MERCER

Google Maps

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By now, you’ve probably heard of Google Earth, a web-based program that lets users view satellite images of our planet and see locations all over the world. Well, imagine Google Earth plus access to the massive amount of geoscientific data and information that scientists have discovered about the world, and you’ve got Dapple Earth Explorer.

Dapple is a global data explorer that makes it easy to find and visualize the huge quantities of geoscientific data available on the Internet, including satellite imagery, geology maps, geophysical data, and lots of other earth data. Derived from the NASA World Wind open source project, Dapple is a free, downloadable program that lets you browse graphically rich data from global and corporate spatial servers – Geosoft DAP servers, NASA servers, USGS servers, ArcIMS servers, and lots of others.

Despite how complicated that may sound, Dapple’s interface is easy to use, and lets you access more geoscientifc data than you will ever need (unless, of course, you are a geoscientist). Not only can you take your students on a trip around the word, you can give them a little taste of the world of geoscience, too. Who knows, you might even have some budding geoscientists in your class! -LAUREN FROHNE

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From its beginning, social studies has been a mashup discipline, the marriage of fuzzy social sciences with more tangible fields like physical geography, to say nothing of history and civics. At times, it can be hard for teachers to make these disparate components seem like functioning parts of the same whole, as opposed to some awkwardly cobbled-together Frankenstein of facts.

Enter Worldmapper, a site that aggregates data from just about every country in the world and displays it visually on a flattened global map. Well, not really a map. A cartogram, which “re-sizes each territory according to the variable being mapped.” For example, a cartogram of GDP wealth shows a gigantic U.S., Europe, and Japan, a sizable China and India, and a tiny just about everywhere else.

Worldmapper has 366 maps so far, with more on the way. The maps are sorted into categories (food, housing, health, death, etc.) for easy browsing and are ready to use in the classroom: Text in the sidebar of each page explains the variable being shown, giving context and sometimes clarifying why a certain country stands out or doesn’t appear at all. Some pages also include relevant quotations or interesting facts. For example, I learned from the alcohol consumption map (What? I was thirsty curious.) that when a baby girl is born in South China, “her parents will brew alcohol for her, bury it underground and keep it until she marries.” (Fascinating!)

You may want to save that one for trivia night with friends. But add this site to your bag of tricks, and watch the world of social studies open before your students’ eyes. -EMILY JACK

Worldmapper

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The world can be a dangerous place. Aside from the business in Iraq, there are problems in Darfur, Chechnya, and the Basques and Spaniards aren’t exactly friendly these days, either. If you teach history or social studies, you can show your students where the hot spots are with World Conflicts Today. Click on the site’s world map and find out the specifics on conflicts around the globe. Find out about key figures, the politics involved, and even get a quick overview with handy PowerPoint presentation.

World history is built on conflict. World Conflicts Today gives you the skinny on the big ones. Hopefully, by learning the issues behind these skirmishes, we can learn how to prevent them in the future. -BILL FERRIS

World Conflicts Today

UPDATE 8/11/08: This site apparently is subscription-only now. As if that weren’t bad enough, there’s no info on how to get a subscription. Good things don’t always last, I guess. -BF

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Have you ever needed the answer to some pressing question, but found yourself no where near a computer and yielded only a cell phone to get your answer? I know I’ve been there many times, especially when traveling, and while you can sometimes text message search engines (or call a web-savvy friend), you can’t always get the answer you need. After being in such a predicament, I’ve often resolved to finally getting a smart phone, but now I don’t have to!

ChaCha  is a service that allows anyone with a mobile phone to text 242 242 (CHACHA) or call 1-800-2CHACHA and ask any question in conversational English and receive an accurate answer as a text message within a few minutes. It basically makes any cell phone a “smart phone,” and the idea is genius really: they don’t use a search engine algorithm with automatically generated responses, but rather a network of knowledgeable human “guides.” And since ChaCha uses people to respond with answers, you can easily reply with follow-up questions as if you are exchanging messages with a friend.

So let’s say you can’t remember who Gabriel falls in love with in Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd (it’s Bathsheba Everdene, by the way), or you need a quick weather update, or you just need to find the closest vegetarian restaurant to your current location, you can just call or text ChaCha and get a great answer quickly.

The service is totally free, too (except for any text message or minute fees  that may apply based on your cell phone plan), so you don’t have to worry about encountering any hidden costs when you get your phone bill. So make your cell phone a bit smarter, and maybe make yourself a little smarter while you’re at it! -LAUREN FROHNE

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Want to take your class on a trip to the Grand Canyon to see the Colorado River? How about a trip to New York City or Paris, France? Can’t afford the gas you say? Well not to worry. With Google Earth 4.3 you can take your students to any location on the globe without leaving the comfort of your classroom, or filling up your gas tank!

If you haven’t used it before, Google Earth is a Web-based program that uses satellite imagery to show places all over the world. All you need to do is download the free program and you are ready to get started. If you have used Google Earth before, version 4.3 has some great new features to take advantage of as you travel around the world. Some of these include photo-realistic buildings, swoop navigation from space to street-level, numerous layers that can be turned on to show anything from locations of volcanoes to the weather. With Google’s new street view, you can place your students virtually on almost any main street in the country. You can show your students how day and night work on our planet by using the dawn to dusk views with the sunlight feature. Take your students to any landform and not only see the 3-D image, but also view all the sight-seeing pictures and information provided by numerous professional organizations to help make this learning experience more memorable.

The new Google Earth 4.3 is out of this world - and if that is your next destination, just click on the outer-space feature and you can explore our solar system in the same way you explored our planet. -MONIQUE ST. LOUIS

Google Earth 4.3

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