Google+Earth+Project+Parent+Letter

Dear Parents, Over the next few weeks your children will be participating in a collaborative project with a number of classroom around the globe. The students will use Google Maps and Google Earth to share local landmarks in order for them to learn about how other students live, and to explore similarities and differences among students in other parts of the world.

To personalize the project, we plan to have each student's chosen landmark include a photograph, either taken by the child or with him or her as the subject. We hope that you will work with us to provide the photo for your child's placemark on the shared map. This will not only be a nice way for you to participate with your child, but it will allow you to determine what photograph you are comfortable submitting as a part of the project.

Children's names will not be attached to their placemarks, and we will only be sharing the maps with the other schools and their families. Because of the collaborative nature of the activity, however, we want to be certain that you are comfortable that the photos that we share will be seen beyond the school community.

With that in mind, please sit with your child an choose a place that is important to him or her and the family. We prefer that it's local (at least within the Tri-State area), and we hope that you will be able to work with your child to provide a photograph and a short description of why it's a special place (no more than a few sentences).

Depending on your comfort level, you can have your child as a direct part of the photo, be in it but at an angle that does not show distinguishing features, or take the picture without being in it. The pictures with descriptions and the location address should be emailed with "Google Earth Project" as the subject. We would like all pictures by February 10th.

We're looking forward to learning about places within our communities that are important each student, and to learning with and from other students throughout the world. Please do not hesitate to contact the school if you have any questions.