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January 25, 2007
In the classroom with GPS
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to work with five classes of fifth and sixth graders to give them their first introduction to the world of GPS. I had anywhere from 35 to 45 minutes so I had to work fast. Here’s what we accomplished.
- Students took about 2 minutes to record in their science notebooks what they already knew about GPS. For some, all they could do was spell GPS. Others knew what the letters meant. And a few had a vague notion that the GPS would enable folks to find their way.
- I did a mini-lecture/questioning session to draw out prior knowledge and to get the very basics down. The knowledge was limited to these facts.
- GPS means Global Positioning System
- The system relies on 24 satellites.
- We did a student participation demo using students as the satellites, myself as a GPSr (receiver), and strings to represent the communication between us. Adding one satellite at a time, we discovered one more fact.
- It takes a minimum of 4 satellites to determine an exact point on the earth’s surface. (Here’s a great explanation.)
- This only works because the satellites are geosynchronous. (Took time out for examining the roots of the word.)
- Location is reported back in latitude and longitude, with reference back to prior geography lessons.
- Using digital photos of the screen of my GPSr from a previous day, we looked at the buttons to push and what was to be expected on the screen.
- Then we took a field trip. Actually, we walked out the door and teams of three got a GPSr each. From here, we accomplished the following.
- Each student got a fix by turning on the GPSr until it gave latitude and longitude.
- Then they walked to some spot in the field (about the size of a football field) and marked their location.
- Each team brought their unit back and another team tried to use the GPSr to go back to the location of the previous team.
- Back to the classroom and we took a quick look at the items hidden nearby on geocaching.com
WHEW!!! I never guessed we’d get that much done in the period and there is much to be followed up on, but overall the kids seemed to understand. Teachers now plan to follow up with other lessons and gradually incorporate the units for other purposes.
Posted by Pat on January 25, 2007 4:46 PM
