Dr. Barbara L. Branch Branch Consulting

Began in 2000 * Military satellites opened to the public * On May 3rd, someone hid a ‘cache’ in Oregon. It was visited twice within 3 days and logged in the log book once. * Mike Teague, the first to find it, built a web page to document the ‘caches. * Jeremy Irish, the current operator of the Geocaching website, expanded the idea and named it ‘geocaching’.

* Individuals hide ‘caches’ or treasure boxes

* They post latitude and longitude on the internet * Others locate the treasure using a GPS unit and log the visit * Sometimes the hunter trades treasures or leave treasures (called swag)

You need a classroom or school set of GPS Units & Compasses * Write a technology grant for $500 - $1000 * Tech Grants Tech Grants * Donors Choose.org Donors Choose.org * Garmin * etrex etrex * GPS 60 GPS 60 * Compasses * Bruton Bruton

GPS Units * Magellan

GPS Units * Lowrance

GPS Units * Garmin

Smartphone app * Geocaching.com

* Teach latitude and longitude * Teach GPS Unit and compass useGPS Unit compass * Teach GPSGPS * Teach geocaching vocabularygeocaching vocabulary * Cache * Swag * FTF * DNF * Log * Waypoints * Geocoins

* Teach the geocaching process Teach the geocaching process * Get started with simple caches that are large enough to see without too much exploring (plastic glad storage containers) * Hide caches in your schoolyard or neighborhood park

* Select a lesson or unit you want to differentiate * Select an activity or final project * Do the activity as a geocaching session * Hide the clues or questions in caches * Students learning about geography, directionality, latitude, and longitude * Tiering can be done by creating various levels of questions, activities, or information for each cache * Compacting can be done by providing different caches for different levels of students.

* History * Explore historic sites, cemeteries, landmarks using GPS * Create a family vacation Create a family vacation * Science * Plot various GPS locations along a local river or lake and evaluate water quality at each location * Use Google Earth to follow the Iditarod Race * Math * Find caches with objects to measure, record, and figure the average * Provide riddles or word problems at each cache

* Active learning * 10% vs 90% of retention * Stimulates students to search further and ask more questions * Gets kids and you outside and physically active * Students can share with their families and create a new healthy family activity * It’s fun It’s fun