Teaching MyMaps Assignment

Last week was the start of a new grading period at my school so I decided to teach them how to post icons onto Google Maps. I had the students sign up for a Gmail account, had them work with a partner to find five things to do in their neighborhoods or city, and then sowed them how to use google maps. Basically, I recreated the first day of ITEC 814 with my students! It took three days. The students really liked all aspects of the assignments, especially personalizing their iGoogle page, and for the most part, they had no problems with using the icons to place on their maps. Some of them did have a hard time placing lines from location to location though. Sometimes they got too close to the icons which ended up moving the icon, others had a hard time with getting the line to start or to stop. I also had a hard time with this when I did this assignment for the first time, so I did warn them about those potential problems. I work with kids who have learning disabilities and they often get frustrated easily, but even when they had a hard time with drawing the lines, they keep with it, so I was very happy. I think they really liked the assignment and they saw it as something fun, so they didn't give up easily. I definitely want to incorporate more of these types of assignments in the future!