Ideas for Tour Builder

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Several of my middle school colleges used Google Tour Builder remotely this week.  I will admit we did have some image issues (but they were resolved by saving the images rather than using the URLs).  Richard Bryne  (Free Technology for Teachers) shared 10 interesting ways to use Google Tour Builder that reach across all disciplines.  You can read his post here

Google Tour Creator

If you have seen the tours created in Google and need a little motivation- check out Alice Keeler’s post here.  It will give you ideas and support to use this tool with your students.

Visit Georgia with Tour Builder

Last week I posted some of my samples of Google Tour Builder- now I have a student sample from Pam Chartock’s class.  Visit Georgia (the country not the state) in this Google Tour- there are some breathtaking sites!

VR Tour Creator and Tour Builder

Last week, Google rolled out  VR Tour Creator.  Now you and your students can

create 360 tours! (Similar to Google Expeditions).  These can be viewed on a mobile

device or in a browser. Here’s a post from Richard Byrne with the basic directions

and I’ve developed step by step directions here.

This has prompted (at least on my end) more interest in Google Tour Builder.  

I’ve just revised my directions.

Which one to use?  Well, it depends what you want to achieve. If you are looking

for a more interactive view (without maps), then Tour Creator will allow you to add

locations, points of interest (images only), and some text. You are sometimes

limited to the number of 360 images.  Here’s a sample one I created.

If you are looking to tell a story (and add videos as well as images) and the map

feature is important, I would go with Tour Builder. Here’s a sample.

Google Tour Builders

I really love this product- and Eric Curts step by step directions are all you need to get started! Think of Google Earth with an easier interface and you can add images, text, and links!  Please click for the link to his webinar (take the quiz at the end and earn PD credit!).  Want to just explore- click here to see Google Tour Builder. Don't have time for the hour session or just want a quick overview? Check out the video by Ryan Bradford below:

Google Tour Builder (or what to see in Nebraska!)

About a month ago, I posted about the Google Tour Builder.  This is a beta product (so it is still in the experimental state) that allows you to easily create a tour using Google Maps.  Maria Vella shared a sample she is using with her third graders.  They will share 3 locations from their states.  Either click here to view.

Create your own tour

Here’s another Google gem I learned from Eric Curts’ webinar- Tour Builder.  While it is out in Beta, I found it easy to use.  Here is the trip I took over Spring Break.  You can add images, video, and more.  Think how this would work for a novel or a history lesson?   Here’s the blog post describing the product (along with several other Google tools).