Placemarks & Ruler

Placemark Assignment

Enter your home address or work address in the Search Window’s Fly to box.  You can often just enter the street address and the ZIP Code.  Don’t be concerned if the view is blurry.  Just zoom out.  Google continues to update these satellite maps, and not all areas have been updated yet.

Your search results are held temporarily, but may be saved. We’ll be adding a placemark for your home.  Public sites such as your school already have placemarks assigned to them.  To find a location such as your school, just enter the school name and ZIP code.  If there is more than one choice, a list will show and you can uncheck the ones you do not want.  Double click to go directly to your desired location.  To delete a location from the temporary search results, simply highlight and press delete.

Placemark Assignment – click on your home address and click the “add placemark icon” on the top of the menu.  Enter your name in the Name field.  Change the look of the placemark by clicking the yellow push pin icon behind your name and selecting a different icon such as a flag or star.  Save locations from your search window by dragging them into your Places window.  You can create folders in Places to organize locations you save.  The file you create is a .kmz file.  The individual location or the entire folder may be saved by right clicking and selecting "Save Place As."

Curriculum Connections
How could the placemarks be used to help students learn about community?  Note: images and other multimedia may be placed in the bookmark description using HTML code (see Docs & Links for step by step directions.)

Google Placemark Guide
http://earth.google.com/userguide/v4/ug_placemarks.html#sharingpoi

Ruler Assignment

If you could fly from home to work instead of drive, how many miles would you save?  To find out you must:

Ruler Assignment
1)   Identify a starting location (home) and ending location (work).  Both should have placemarks (created by you or by Google Earth.)

2)  Use the Ruler tool.  The ruler window floats and can be moved around.  When the window is open, whatever location you click on in Google Earth begins the measurement and indicates a starting or ending point for the ruler.

3)  To begin measuring…first be on the Line tab.  Click one time on the beginning location (it creates a red point) and let up the mouse button.  If needed you can use the keyboard controls so you can see the ending location (or start the process more zoomed out.)  Click a second time of the ending location.  Once clicked, the line end points can be relocated by clicking and dragging on the end point.  In the Ruler dialogue box, the distance will be displayed.  The unit of measure can be set to miles, kilometers, feet, inches, etc.  Most users have to clear the window and try it a few times to get the measurement correct.  Record the distance “as a crow flies”

4)   In Layers turn on the Road layer and any other layers you may need for the second measurement assignment.  To measure the driving distance from home to work, use the Ruler’s Path measurement tool.  Click the starting location and click at each corner, where you change directions.  The points you create can be moved by clicking and dragging.  A cumulative distance is calculated as you click.  If you mess up, just clear it and start again.  Record the distance as you drive.  Does it seem correct?  If you could fly from home to work, how many miles would you save?

Curriculum Connections
What could students measure to better understand measurement concepts?  Examples include: the distance from one shore to another, the distance down the Mississippi River, the length of the Great Wall of China.  The polygon tool and the circle tool could be used to help student understand area or the blast diameter of an explosion.  Consider how could the ruler help students to understand standard to metric conversations?