Google for Educators!

In July I attended ISTE's National Education Computing Conference (NECC) in San Diego. There was a Google booth and some folks taking names and email addresses for a new "teacher" connection planned for Google. This week, I received my first "Google Teacher Newsletter" which stated, in part,

Visit us at: http://www.google.com/educators for a teacher's guide to 12 Google products. You'll find information about each tool, examples of how educators are using them, and lesson ideas. You'll also find lesson plans and videos from our partners at DiscoveryEducation focusing on two of our most popular teaching tools: Google Earth and Google SketchUp.

We think of the site as a basic platform of teaching resources -- for everything from blogging and videos to geographical search tools and 3-D modeling software -- and we want you to fill it in with your great ideas. You can explore a Google tool you've never tried before, then tell us what you think about it. Or road test our lesson ideas, then follow the links to submit your own. And if you'd like to share your expertise with fellow educators, we encourage you to send us your story -- we'd love to feature it in this newsletter or on the site.

Google Earth's direct education link is http://www.google.com/educators/p_earth.html. Visit this site for some exemplary education examples, including using resources from our subscription-based video on demand server, unitedstreaming, and an inspiring message from the Discovery Educator Network Directory, Hall Davidson, "Google Earth enables teachers and communities to easily create tremendous collections of work integrating video, 3D buildings, photos, podcasts, or NPR stories."