Finding New Virtual Field Trips Resources

A trip to a sunny climate would certainly be fun during this very cold and snowy winter. Maybe I need to look for a trip to Sarasota or Santa Fe. Instead I'm updating my virtual field trips resources for an upcoming workshop.

Preschool Veggie Picking Field Trip / Grace Family / CC BY 2.0

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Here are some virtual field trips resources I found at Scoop.it!

Scooped by April...
10 Wonderful Virtual Field Trips for Your Students
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/04/10-wonderful-virtual-field-trips-for.html
Note: these virtual field trips truly are wonderful... I spent entirely too much time exploring them because they are so interesting!

• Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History... explore on your own or take a tour

• Arctic Tour... are you ready to explore via dog-sledding?

• Moon Tour... 3D models, 360-degree photos, TV footage, landing site tours narrated by Apollo astronauts... using Moon in Google Earth

• Google Art Project... imagine an art museum with images from museums around the world and with tools to help you learn about art and art history... explore, take a tour, view art in detail, build your own gallery, share

• Planet in Action... tools that take your exploration and use of Google Earth to new levels

• World Wonders Project... explore and/or tour wonders of the ancient world and the modern world

• Eternal Egypt... tour and/or explore ancient Egypt with virtual environments, 3D views, 360-degree views, animations, webcams, and zoomable pictures

• A Virtual Tour of Museums and Exhibits... visit more than 300 tours created with text, pictures, sound, and/or videos

• Digital Field Trip to the Rainforest... this site sells their education products including some virtual field trips... however some free resources and demos are available

• Virtual Field Trips... a list of many virtual field trips

While at the Educational Technology and Mobile Learning site I followed a link about using Google Hangouts on Air to facilitate virtual field trips. 
Google+ Connected Classrooms Brings the World into Your Class
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/11/google-connected-classrooms-brings.html
This virtual field trip uses Google Hangouts On Air (live video conferences). Note: you can watch past field trips and/or participate in upcoming field trips such as the following ones:

• virtual tour of a facility

• discussion with an expert

• demonstration of museum artifacts

• collaborative activity with another classroom elsewhere in the world

• student activities

• sessions that permit students to pose questions to the live participants

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At LiveBinders I was intrigued with virtual field trips resources that include instructions for using Skype, podcasts, and Google Earth.

Virtual Field Trips 
Kathy Pryor
http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=229243
Her virtual field trips include Skype, podcasts, and iPad apps.

Virtual Field Trips 
Vicki Johnson
https://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=139864
This resource includes an extensive section on Google Earth.

Many more virtual field trip resources are available in LiveBinders. I pulled out two resources that interest me. However, you may have other needs or uses than I do and, thus, choose different resources.

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Here are some virtual field trips resources I found on Symbaloo webmixes.

The first time I saw some of the excellent work of Jayme Linton was when I discovered her Symbaloo webmix for Virtual Field Trips. It is one of my favorites.
https://www.symbaloo.com/mix/virtualfieldtrips9
Even though I am searching for new virtual field trips resources I am including hers on this list in case you have not seen it yet.

Take Your Students on a Virtual Field Trip Every Day
Jayme Linton
In this article Linton recommends using virtual field trips as an alternative to regular bell work or morning work.
http://techtipsforteachersblog.blogspot.com/2013/10/take-your-students-on-virtual-field.html
Note: you may find this idea for using virtual field trips useful for your classroom.

To find additional Symbaloo virtual field trip resources go to the Symbaloo Gallery to search for virtual field trips. 

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Next I used Storify to search for discussions of virtual field trips on social media.
http://storify.com/search?q=virtual+field+trip

Storify allows you to examine the tweets, images, videos, and links about virtual field trips that appear in social media... and then choose the ones you want to use.
Pick and choose to find links for virtual field trips, advice and suggestions, new ideas!

Here's four ideas Storify found on social media for me:

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My last search for virtual field trips resources was on Twitter... well, actually, on TweetDeck.

I searched for #virtualfieldtrip and for virtual field trip.

I found Virtual Trillium Trail
Maria C. R. Harrington’s, Ph.D. 
http://www.virtualfieldtrips.com/drupal1/ 
This site looks very interesting.

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In the past I have searched for virtual field trips in Delicious and in Google using keywords. This time I used a different approach. Scoop.it!, LiveBinders, Symbaloo, Storify, and Twitter / TweetDeck serve me well for curation and communication. So, I used them to see what's new on the topic of virtual field trips.

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If you have not previously used virtual field trips, you might want to check out this lesson (http://online.howtomaster.com/training/html/itc2/itc20201/start.html) about virtual field trips. It is available on the SimpleK12 free teacher resources Symbaloo webmix (http://www.symbaloo.com/mix/simplek12?searched=true).