Google World Wonders

As a former Geography teacher, Google World Wonders sounded wonderful to me.  In the World Geography SOLs there are World Monuments which the students have to be able to identify--Taj Mahal, Big Ben, the Gateway Arch, etc. I knew that Google World Wonders utilized Google Earth street level imagery and I figured that this would be a terrific way to teach these monuments.  Well,  it is, but, I was disappointed to learn that the monuments which can be visited on a World Wonders virtual field trips are limited to a mere 173. This means that of the cultural monuments in the United States, for example,  the Golden Gate Bridge and Independence Hall are among the wonders included, but, the U.S. Capital building and the Gateway Arch are not. Neither is the Eiffel Tower.

With both the capital building and the Eiffel Tower, I found that if I clicked on the Maps icon in my Google Apps box, searched for these locations, and then switched to the street level view, they have some terrific views of those landmarks.  That being the case, why would a geography teacher, or any other teacher, use the World Wonders site rather than just using Google Maps?  I, for one, would certainly use both were I still in the classroom.

 What Google World Wonders has that a street level view elsewhere may not have would be "details"--that is some script giving a bit of  background information about the site. They also have "collections", put together by Google.  These collections might include historic photographs as well as current ones.  For example, you can compare Louis XIV's bedroom as it appeared in the 19th century with how it looks today. In addition you can look  through "user galleries" which is just what the name implies--pictures put together in an album, which some user has created for others to view. Quite often these galleries will include comments from the user as well as details about where the photograph came from, etc. Finally, you can create your own collections--that is, you can gather various items available at Google World Wonders into an album of your own--organize them, add comments, and then show them, or make them available to your students. However, you cannot add photos or other items from outside the project (except for YouTube videos--which you can add--so I guess you could put photos into a YouTube video and add that--once you take care of the filtering issues.)

Here is what someone else had to say about the educational use of World Wonders:

"The World Wonders Project offers an Education page dedicated to assisting educators in history and geography topics. Teacher guides are available for primary school and secondary school. These guides include activity sheets, lesson plans, and presentations. Beyond the obvious use of the free guides, the resources, pictures, historical content and 360 degree view are easy to use and are organized for quick accessibility in the classroom.... The most developed program is secondary school history and geography topics. History topics include: Hiroshima Peace Memorial, Pompei, Herculaneum and Torre Annuziata, Liverpool, Palace of Versailles, Florence, and Independence Hall. Geography topics include: Ogasawara Islands, Dorset and East Devon Coast, and Paris. Each topic includes teaching activity sheets, lesson plans, and presentations."

Etec602.wikispaces.com,. 'Etec602 - Google World Wonders Project'. N. p., 2015. Web. 6 Feb. 2015.

Again, if I were in the classroom, I'd certainly ALSO use Google Maps or Google Earth to bring a street level view of World Monuments to my Geography students.  In addition to Social Studies applications, Google World Wonders might be useful for literature, science (World Wonders includes some nice underwater shots), and even math (angles on the Eiffel Towers, math problems involving the Leaning Tower of  Pisa, etc.) What can you come up with?