Electronic Virtual Field Trips

[Cyndi Danner-Kuhn]

Please tell us about the Virtual Trip you created. Share the URL and did you find any during your research you could share with the class.

[Ginger Lewman]

I've talked and talked to schools about doing this, but so far, we really haven't done anything real! We've sent some pics to a school in Long Island NY about our local Santa Fe Trail. And I've talked to several other schools, including a teacher in Australia, and we've shared many, many learning experiences (including dissecting alligator guts with a surgical nurse) but as for sharing a true field trip, we've not been terribly successful.

The thing that may be closest: We were sent a type of "flat stanley" in the form of a tiny teddy bear. We took this bear (whom we dubbed "Anna Marie") with us to a trip to Wichita where my kids were keynoting a 21st Century Learners Conference for teachers. When we got back to town, we took a few more minutes and took little Anna Marie around to sites here in Emporia. We wrote little diary entries for her (in a NOTEBOOK, of all places) and sent it to the next school, which I think was in Washington. Since we were writing in a notebook and not a blog, we went ahead and wrote in URL's to various tourist spots so the kids could look deeper into where Anna Marie had been. Here're the flickr photos. We sent a link back to the teacher.

Unfortunately, we have no idea if she made it to Washington, or to the other 3 stops before going back to San Antonio, TX. If the teacher had set it up as an electronic thing, where Anna Marie had a BLOG, we'd have been able to track her. But this was a really one-dimensional project for my kids. meh.

Does this response fit this category?

[Amy Brungardt]

I found this virtual field trip to be really good, and even helpful for creating a tour of a city for students who are not here. I love the idea - and like the versatility of it. I will be honest, I found it to be a little overwhelming just because it seems like a big project to do with little time. I think if I could sit down and completely devote a large amount of time, I could really create something for my students that would be incredible and interesting. I see the potential of it being useful, fun, and amazing, but I don't think I did that exactly in this one. I would like to in the future devote more time to creating one that is exceptional, and maybe will do so. But I am glad I had the experience to do it, and now know it's available to use from others as well as create my own. Here is my link to the Virtual Field Trip tour of Hays, KS.

http://voicethread.com/share/163798/

I mentioned in my video the standards I used, but just in case, I will mention them here too. It is to align with 4th grade, Kansas, United States, and World History Standard; Benchmark 1, Indicator 1.

[Cyndi Danner-Kuhn]

It is so exciting that you really do get the point of why we are trying these things. Yippy Skippy!!!! I agree summer session is so fast it is difficult to do a project indept. But at least we are discovering the possibilities.

[Emily Baker]

I really enjoyed this project!! I definitely felt a little overwhelmed at times; it seemed like a huge project to complete. But, I was satisfied with the finished project, and I know that this is a tool that will be so much fun and a great tool to use in my own classroom. I agree with Amy in the fact that this is a tool that I could spend HOURS upon HOURS creating a masterpiece of a field trip to share with my class. This was a great way to learn how to create virtual field trips-and I know that I will improve with each one I create! Here is my virtual field trip of Lake Scott State Park, Scott City, Kansas. Enjoy! I mentioned my standards in the field trip, but I will also mention them here-the trip is to go along with 4th grade Social Studies, Benchmark 1 and 2.

http://voicethread.com/share/166042/

[Hunter Ward]

Wow, what an experience, I have to be honest when I read this assignment I was excited to do it. If you haven't noticed by now, I'm all for giving our students as many opportunities to broaden their horizons as possible. It was hard to decide where I was going to take my students but I finally decided on Moscow, Russia. I realized that most standards probably wouldn't cover the Cold War or World War 2 in 5th grade so I had to base it more towards geography. I really didn't want to use any place around Hays because I thought other people would, and I didn't want to use other peoples pictures off the internet, so Moscow it was. I used the voicethread website because i found it very friendly. Although I'm happy with my final product, I feel that if I really worked at it, this could be an experience that would blow the students minds. Really, really cool
http://voicethread.com/share/166065/

[Mathew Needleman]

Here are virtual factory searches of hundreds of factories...could be of use...http://www.superfactory.com/content/tours.htm

[Cyndi Danner-Kuhn]

thanks for sharing those, some are excellent, and I agree could be very useful.

[KEvin Hoff]

I thought the Virtual Fieldtrip was really fun and I was excited to do it. I did my virtual fieldtrip over Great Bend, Kansas which is my hometown. I tried to incorporate as much historical stuff on there as I could but I also put a lot of the attractions that there are to see in my fieldtrip. I used my dad as a source to interview him about the Great Bend waterpark since he is the Human Resource director for the city of Great Bend. He is in charge of the waterpark so he was a really good tool for me to use. I mainly chose to talk using video clips of myself and my dad since I thought that would add a little more to the assignmnet. I thought this was a fairly simple assignment using voicethread because I could incorporate about anything that I wanted. The URL to this voicethread is posted here.
http://voicethread.com/share/168044/

[Jenny May Stewart]

I thought this virtual fieldtrip experience was really fun! It took a lot of time to prepare information as well as make sure that it was accurate however the final result was well worth it. I currently live in Great Bend, Kansas therefore that is the city that I choose to do a history virtual fieldtrip on. It is amazing how much I learned about my own town that I wasn't even aware of before. I think this is a great way to expose your students to a variety of things without having to physically take them anywhere. As mentioned in my virtual trip, I aligned my video with the fourth grade, Kansas, United States, and World History Standard, Benchmark 1, Indicator 1.

http://voicethread.com/share/168350/

[carolyn Walker]

http://voicethread.com/share/166770/
My virtual field trip is a trip through the years in Minneola, Ks. My husband and I have lived in Minneola now for 14 years. We have really enjoyed the time we have spent here. When I started this virtual field trip I didn't know much about the history of how Minneola came to be a town, now I know a little about it's history and little more about the people who built this small town in southwestern ks. It was fun to learn some historical facts about Minneola. I enjoyed this project very much and will look forward to showing my students virtual field trips in class.
Third grade standards: History standard, Benchmark 2, indicator 1

[Chris Schmidtberger]

I created a Field Trip about our last day at Summer School 2007. The lesson could be used to help 4th grade students understand the geography of a school. The Thread itself isn't really good, but it's definitely decent. I certainly would like to incorporate this into my teaching experience. Especially the voice thread about authors like the article we read.

http://voicethread.com/share/170150/