Friday 8 September 2017

Year 3 Exploring our Community with a 360 Camera

Year Three wanted to use the Google Cardboards and Street View to navigate the local community. They were looking particularly at the services that were available such as ; the Police Station, Banks, Supermarkets etc.



Last year when we undertook this project, the students found it clumsy trying to navigate to the Yonhi - Dong area and then finding the appropriate photos which had been submitted by other people.

To make it a more useful project we took our own 360 degree photos around the community. This mean't we had photos in locations where the students could find what they were looking for.
It was a straightforward process uploading the photos from the camera to the iphone and then into Google StreetView. (The Ricoh software allows you upload directly to Street View so it may cut out a couple of steps).

For the students they were able to take the iPads in their classroom, open Street View and then select the location icon. This took them straight to the Yonhi-Dong area. They then scrolled through the available photos until they found one submitted by the teacher. By clicking on the teacher's profile picture they were then about to see all 10 photo that  had been uploaded. The students were also able to scroll through them easily and check off the services they were looking for.
The project was a success as the students were able to spend time looking for the services in the community and the technology did not get in the way.


This was a great lesson to do as a precursor to actually taking a walk through the community.

The photos could also be upload to be viewed in Pagoda or on any web platform. Images were uploaded to 360 Player site (https://360player.io) where you can create a free account.
You then can either copy the link or the embed code and paste it to any site. In Pagoda you place it in the "Embed the Web" content block.





For more information about the project, email:

Resources:
Ricoh Theta 360 camera
mobile device with the Ricoh 360 app (free download)
Google Street View (free)
iPads
online 360player site (free account)

Time:
Taking photos (60 minutes)
Uploading to Street View (10 minutes)
Uploading to 360 Player (20 minutes including setting up an account)