Google Earth

Google Earth is a tool created by Google that can transport you to any part of the world (now including the moon). Google earth is a virtual reality tool that is computer illiterate friendly. In order to use Google Earth to the fullest one should download it for free. The newest version of Google Earth is Google Earth 5 which includes historical imagery from around the world, Ocean floor and surface data from marine experts, and Simplified touring with audio and voice recording. In addition Google Earth gives its user the ability to film tours to any place in the world. You can fly to any place in the world by giving the address of the place you want to go. You can then mark the location you found with a placemark. Also if the user wishes to look at their favorite baseball stadium they can do so and visualize the 3D picture of it. Google Earth can even take you back in time or even change the time of day. In general Google Earth is the gateway to a whole new form of technology.

Google Earth could be incorporated into a mathematics classroom to help show pyramids and to teach the law of sin, law of cosine, and basic trig to a Calculus class, geometry class, or even algebra with the Pythagorean Theorem. The Great Pyramids of Giza can be found and then you can use the information attached to it's location (a snipping from Google Earth is located above and to the right). With the information provide a student can find the angles of the pyramids, the height, or even how the shadow long the shadow cast by the pyramids during any given time of day. This can be quite useful and a fun interactive way to use it in the classroom. Then after this the students could even pick a landmark that interests them and perform the same tasks done in class as a project grade.