I had a 2:00 reservation at Emeril Legasse’s restaurant. This session started at 1:50. My one thought as I watch my colleagues get in the taxi was, "My god, I hope this session is worth it!"
Currently Google Earth is blocked in our district. It seems that there is a conflict with our Internet Filter and the blocks it uses for to lock image searches in Safe Search mode. So, as a prelude to this session, I spent part of the morning talking to the techs and reps of St. Bernard, maker of our IPrism filters. I let them know in no uncertain terrms the sacrifice I made for this session, and the fact that they damn well better find a solution to my Google Earth problem, or I was going to find another Internet filter.
Anyhoo, on to John Kuglin’s presentation. Kuglin is at the University of Montana, and his background is in remote sensing with satellite imagery. This session feature an overview of the Google Earth application. Most of it was fairly basic stuff. However, I did learn how to do image overlays and how to imbed some other fairly interesting things into the GE information boxes. For that reason alone, missing Emeril was worth it.
I had seen tons of image overlays used in files posted on the Keyhole BBS, but hadn’t realized how they were created. It would be possible to overlay an old map of an area, then turn the layers on and off to do comparisons. I wish I’d had this when I was doing my Oldtown Greenville studies back when I was teaching. I could also see this as being a great boon for third and eighth grade teachers covering South Carolina history (or any other history, for that matter.)
The session did inspire me, so assuming St. Bernard can get their act together, I may just have to put together that GE workshop for teachers this summer.