Local Students Explore the Spanish-Speaking World with Virtual Google Earth Tours
A creative classroom project is giving students a taste of global travel—without ever leaving their desks.
In a recent assignment, students used their VILS Chromebooks to dive into Google Earth to design immersive virtual tours of Spanish-speaking countries. The project required them to showcase local food, cities, landmarks, and monuments, making viewers feel as though they were exploring the destination in real life.
To enhance authenticity, each student used Google Earth’s “capture view” feature to provide street-level images of hotels, restaurants, and iconic sites. The result? A vibrant, interactive experience far beyond a standard slideshow.
“The students really enjoyed this project, and it was so much more entertaining to watch than a Google Slide presentation,” Ms. Apodaca explained. “They knew a lot about all the places they ‘visited’ and were able to speak naturally about them, instead of reading from a script.”
The approach encouraged students to research deeply while practicing spontaneous speaking skills. It also proved flexible enough to inspire other disciplines. “This type of project could be used in an English class, history class, or any language class,” the teacher noted.
By blending technology, creativity, and cultural exploration, the Google Earth virtual tour project turned a typical classroom presentation into a dynamic learning journey.