<

Android 4 Schools

Apps and Devices for Schools

Tag Archives: social studies

Fun and Education With GPS Essentials

Yesterday, I published a post about creating QR codes for GPS locations to build scavenger hunts. In that post I mentioned an app called GPS Essentials that a friend turned me on to. I spent some time last evening having fun testing out GPS Essentials.

In addition to the expected features of showing your current latitude and longitude coordinates, GPS Essentials offers a bunch of other useful features. Using GPS Essentials you can measure your current altitude, measure distances, and record your tracks. You can export your tracks and waypoints as KML files to use in Google Earth and Google Maps. You can also import KML and GPX files to use in GPS Essentials to navigate to various locations.

Combine the use of QR-GPS Plugin with GPS Essentials to create and carry-out scavenger hunts. Use the combination to record and plan walking tours for your next field trip. Or use GPS Essentials to teach students basic lessons on navigation (if you’re taking students on actual hikes, long bike rides, or paddling trips, don’t use GPS Essentials as a replacement for a real GPS unit and maps).

Create QR Codes for GPS Coordinates to Create Scavenger Hunts

QR Droid is my favorite free QR code reader for Android devices. QR Droid website offers a free QR code generator that makes it very easy to create a QR code for just about anything. This weekend I installed a free plug-in for QR Droid called QR-GPS Plugin.

QR-GPS Plugin works with the free QR Droid app to allow you to quickly create QR codes for the GPS coordinates for wherever you are standing. You ca also manually input coordinates or manually input a location by entering an address. Whichever way you choose to input locations, the QR code that is generated for you can be share via text message, email, Twitter, or Facebook. You can also save the code to your SD card and print it. (Of course, if you emailed the QR code to yourself you could print it from there too).

When you scan the QR code generated by QR-GPS Plugin you can open it within a number of different Android apps including Google Earth, Google Maps,  and GPS Essentials. The QR Droid blog has detailed directions on how to use the QR-GPS Plugin.

For academic activities using the QR codes generated from QR-GPS Plugin, I have a few thoughts (with a little help from a friend).  First, since the codes easily open in Google Earth and Google Maps you could create geography puzzles in which students use clues to guess the location to which you’re leading them. Then to check their answers students scan the QR codes and open them in Google Earth or Google Maps on their tablets or phones. Second, create a scavenger hunt in which students go from location to location scanning QR codes to get directions to the next stop in the hunt. Finally, the QR codes could be scanned and saved in Google Maps or GPS essentials for students to use as part of a walking tour.

Google Currents Updates and Goes International

When Google Currents was released in December I immediately installed it on my Samsung Galaxy Tablet. Google Currents is a virtual magazine rack that you can read on your Android device or on your iOS device. Google Currents offers a magazine style display of content from more than 400 media distributors. Additionally, you can sync your Google Reader account to Google Currents. Any content that you sync can be read online or offline. I use Google Currents to read the news when I’m flying without an Internet connection.

Today, Google announced that Currents is now available internationally. Google Current now offers translation of text too.

Applications for Education

Using Google Currents can be a great way for students in global studies courses or any course that discusses current news to stay informed of the latest news about a wide variety of topics. Some of the content providers that could be quite useful for that are The Guardian and The Atlantic.

The American Civil War Gazette – What Happened on This Day?

The American Civil War Gazette could be a handy Android app for US History teachers and students. The app serves up newspaper reports and dispatches from each day of the US Civil War. The stories that are displayed on the app each day are stories that appeared in print on that day during the Civil War. For example, today is January 11, 2012 and the stories that appeared in the app today are from January 11, 1862.

The American Civil War Gazette features stores from publications like The New York Times, The London Times, and the Richmond Dispatch. Each day new articles appear on The American Civil War Gazette. The current day’s articles are free, but previous editions require a subscription. If you’re teaching lessons about the Civil War and want to inject a little “on this day in history” element, The American Civil War Gazette could be useful for quickly finding that information.

News 360 – A Personalized News App

News 360 is a free news aggregation service that you can customize for your interests. You can read your personalized news feed on your phone, tablet, or desktop. The mobile app is available for iPhone, iPad, Blackberry Playbook, Android phones and tablets, and Windows phones. You can also read your News 360 feed on your computer. You can find the Android tablet app here and the Android phone app here.

To get started using News 360 you do have to register with your Twitter or Facebook credentials. Then select the types of stories that you’re interested in reading. News 360 will use that information to serve up the stories that are most likely to appeal to you. You can create multiple interest channels. For example, I created a channel for sports stories and one for education stories.

Watch the video below for a short overview of News 360.

Teachers who use current events as a part of their regular instruction could use News 360  to keep up with stories that are relevant to their students. Teachers who have students give short presentations or reports on current events (many social studies teachers I know do that), could have students create News 360 accounts to discover news stories that they can share with their peers.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Switch to our mobile site