SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY Now Students Take Field Trips Online
from the Christian Science Monitor Stockton, Calif. - When
seventh graders in Stockton took a field trip this week to see
elephant seals, they didn't even step outside their school.
Instead, with the help of a projector and a video camera, the
students teleconferenced with a state park guide on the
California coast. Across a distance of 100 miles, students on
the so-called "virtual field trip" got to talk with the guide,
watch seals throw sand on themselves, and hear the blubbery
beasts belch and bark - all without a yellow bus or permission
slip. "If you can't go somewhere, this can be the next best
thing," says Craig Wedegaertner, an administrator at Marshall
Middle School in Stockton. "Or, it can be used to prepare
[students] before they go there."