A Candidate Watch with Google Tools
Geography, Politics and Civic Literacy

From presidential elections to state and local contests, use collaborative interactive tools to engage your students in the election story.  With a project-based approach, help them follow the issues, the politics and use analysis as they become involved in the election process.

Start with Google Earth
http://earth.google.com/

1. In teams, assign students a candidate or election issue to watch.

2. Teams locate and "Placemark" candidate locations and campaign stops in a Google Earth tour.  

3. In "Placemark Descriptions", teams include pertinent information such as links to the candidate web site and links to news sites or videos that report on candidate speeches.  Students can reflect on candidate speeches or campaign ads in Google Docs or a Blog and link that to the Placemark. (See below).

4. Using Earth's "Image Overlay", teams place photos of the candidates or pictures depicting issues on the map using geography to help tell the election story.  
            
5. Teams update their candidate's "Placemark" with additional videos and links as the campaign progresses (including campaign ads).

6. Teams save file as a "kmz" to share with class. (In Earth go to: File/Save/Save Place as)

7. Teacher centralizes current kmz file from each team and combines files to make a class "kmz candidates file". Each time student kmz files are updated, teacher adds them to class "kmz candidates file". Ongoing class discussion centers on the role of geography in an election, the electoral college, the campaigns and the issues.


Continue with Docs & Spreadsheets
http://docs.google.com/
1. Set up a collaborative Google Docs and Spreadsheet. Each team analyses the candidate's stand on issues and reflects on each candidate's chances of winning.  In the Google Spreadsheet the class keeps a collaborative tally of state electoral college numbers and charts possible scenarios of the election outcome as they follow polls and election analysis..

2. Teams share, update and revise their documents as they continue to follow the candidates.


Add a  Backstory  Google Search
http://news.google.com/archivesearch
Teams research, reflect and record (in Google Docs) links to background news stories on each candidate.  They use Google Search News Archives to create a timeline of news articles. They brainstorm a list of common questions to apply as they research the news. e.g. Has the candidate's views on issues changed over time?  Is there anything in the background of the candidate that might prove to be a problem in the campaign?  


Top it off with  Google Blogger
http://www2.blogger.com/
Set up a class Blog where students can voice their opinions about the 2008 campaign. Each student team takes turns with Blog entries and contributing comments.  Blog entries may include topics such as political ads, local Issues from the campaign trail and, of course, links to the candidate's Blog, where students can make additional comments participating in the political discourse!


Lesson resource sites for students:

• C-SPAN Classroom: http://www.c-spanclassroom.org/ Teachers can join C-SPAN Classroom for free.
• 270 to Win: http://www.270towin.com/

Cheryl Davis -Acalanes Union High School District