Google Lit Trip Lesson Plan

Overview: 

4^th Grade lesson – the class will read and reflect on the book Seaman:  the Dog Who Explored the West with Lewis and Clark by Gail Langer Karwoski.  Students will use Google Lit Trip to plot Lewis and Clark’s expedition to highlight important events.

Materials: 

·         Computers with Internet Access

·         LCD projector

·         SmartBoard

·         Printer

·         15 copies of Seaman:  the Dog Who Explored the West with Lewis and Clark

·         Graphic Organizer

Procedure:

1.   Introduce Google Lit Trips and tell students that they will be creating one together as a class for the trip they are about to go on with Lewis and Clark

2.   Introduce the book and read the first chapter to the students

3.   Students and teacher will then use the graphic organizer to summarize the first chapter together

4.   Students will then work in pairs and work on their assigned chapters reading and filling in the graphic organizer

5.   Students will then present their graphic organizers and summaries to the class

6.   Teacher will take students on a tutorial of Google Earth and Google Lit Trips allowing students to experiment with the tools and features along the way

7.   Students will then input their place markers, summaries pictures and discussion questions about their chapter

8.   Upon completion students will then have the opportunity to go through the entire Google Lit Trip to see all the work they and their classmates did and to go on Lewis and Clark’s expedition.

Content:

Content Standard 3: All students will describe, compare, and explain the locations and characteristics of economic activities, trade, political activities, migration, information flow, and the interrelationships among them. (Location, Movement and Connections) II.3.4 - Describe some of the major movements of goods, people, jobs and information within Michigan and the United States and explain the reasons for the movements.

SS4H6 The student will explain westward expansion of America between

1801 and 1861. The student will

a. Describe territorial expansion with emphasis on the Louisiana Purchase, the

Lewis and Clark expedition, and the acquisitions of Texas (the Alamo and

independence), Oregon (Oregon Trail), and California (Gold Rush and the

development of mining towns).

Using the story of Lewis and Clark students will learn about why people went west to explore and expand our country.  Students will be able to identify a number of reasons that are illustrated in the adventures of Lewis and Clark.  They will be able to use what they learned to make connections and draw conclusions.  Students will be able to identify what makes a certain location important or significant for migration within the United States.

Pedagogy:

Students will be responsible for summarizing a chapter of the book Seaman:  the Dog Who Explored the West with Lewis and Clark by Gail Langer Karwoski.  Students will be given a graphic organizer to help them with their summary.  After summarizing, students will create discussion questions to help teach the rest of the class about their section of the book.  Using Google Lit Trip, the class will create place markers with pictures, summary and discussion questions to create a virtual map of Lewis and Clark’s exploration.  To support students the teacher will provide scaffolding by modeling and working with students on how to fill out their graphic organizers to create a summary.  The use of Google Lit Trip as a technological tool is also engaging to students and helps them stay focused on the essential questions.

Content & Pedagogy: How do these particular strategies help you teach the content mentioned above? Why choose these strategies over other approaches? Are there any technical or physical constraints that figured significantly into your choices?

Technology:

The technology that I will be using is called Google Lit Trip.  This is a way, using Google Earth, to map out where main characters traveled in a novel and mark significant locations with images and/or a summary of what happened there.  It then allows students to see the entire journey from start to finish with all of the points they marked along the way.  Students will have a visual representation of the journey the characters had and a better understanding of the history.  For example in this lesson I have planned to use Lewis and Clark.  In the book it talks about the different places these two uncovered on their exploration.  Students will be able to see a geographical location and images of these areas to go along and support the learning they got from the text which will greatly enrich the learning experience.

Technology & Pedagogy:

The technology of Google Lit Trips is an engaging tool for students to use.  It also helps keep students focused on the essential questions.  Presenting the objectives and essential questions in the beginning of the lesson will let students know what is expected of them.  Knowing what they will have to do with Google Lit Trips, students will have a set goal to help them stay focused.  They will focus on the summary, the location of where things happened, discussion questions about these events and images to go with them. In this way the technology not only enriches the content but also works as a guide to keep students on task and in the right direction

Technology & Content:

The technology supports the essential questions because it lets students see how we can better understand history when we have visuals to go along with it.  Students will be able to use the technology to see where on the globe the actual locations Lewis and Clark explored as well as images to help support the text.

Assessment:

Students will have to know the locations of Lewis and Clarks exploration and place markers on the Google Lit Trip.  Students will also be assessed on their presentation of the place marker they added to the Google Lit Trip and the summary and discussion questions from their chapter.