CHESTNUT ESL/EFL

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1. PragmaticStatistic says:

   September 1, 2011 at 21:17

   In a search, I found a comment from your web site about my blog MyReadingMapped. However, I could not find the full comment. I was hoping to discover how teachers would use the 33 interactive maps of historic events I have created.

   In the past I have found a teacher who was using my Lewis and Clark map to teach his students the importance of writing journals since each of the identified locations on the map integrates with Lewis and Clark’s actual journal entries for each day. Thus, the student can zoom in on the actual location in Google Map, read Lewis and Clark’s journals about what happened that day and how far they traveled. The other explorer maps contain quotes from the explorer’s book; along with the page reference for each location and day. The student can then read online the complete 100+ year old Google Book for free via the link I provided. Thus, the student can read the book and follow it day-by-day on a map they can zoom in on to see the actual locations, buildings and pyramids.

   Check out my site map to see a complete list of the historic events covered at http://myreadingmapped.blogspot.com/p/site-map-of-myreadingmapped.html

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2. PragmaticStatistic says:

   September 6, 2011 at 21:17

   Thanks to Chestnut ESL, here is what I believe is an interesting student e-lesson by a teacher from New Zealand.

   According to MyReadingMapped’s web site analytics, 19 visitors from Auckland, New Zealand all logged on to my Interactive Map of the Travels of Marco Polo at the same time, using the same Internet Service Provider, at 1 PM New Zealand time on Monday, September 5, 2011.

   Evidently the teacher first had them do an Internet search for which they entered the following variations:

   map of places that marco polo visited
   map of places that marko polo visited
   map of places marco polo visited
   map of place that marco polo visited
   the travels of marco polo the book
   place marco polo visited interactive map
   interactive map of places that marco polo visited
   places marco polo visited- interactive map

   All of which placed MyReadingMapped’s Marco Polo map within the top 4 searches.

   Upon entering my blog, they spent an average of four and a half minutes reading about my site, and the Marco Polo map, and checked out two web pages, before clicking the link under the embedded map to go to the larger original map in Google Maps. Google Maps separate tracking accounted for all 19 of the students.

   This interactive map has chapter links for each location Marco Polo visited that are linked to Wikipedia’s Henry Yale translation of The Travels of Marco Polo; and the student can zoom in on the actual location and see photos of the location and view the terrain as well.

   Thus, I suspect the students got a lot out of this teacher’s lesson.

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   • ANNA COSTIKOGLOU says:

     September 6, 2011 at 21:17

     I appreciate your feedback, keep up with the excellent work!

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     • PragmaticStatistic says:

       September 7, 2011 at 21:17

       The students from New Zealand returned to the Marco Polo map again today. So, I suspect they are getting something out of it. I will track it to see how long it lasts. From what I can tell about 9% return the same day.

3. PragmaticStatistic says:

   September 25, 2011 at 21:17

   It has now been 24 days since the New Zealand students began using the Interactive Map of Marco Polo. In this period, the 20 students generated 78 visits from New Zealand. In this time period, the Marco Polo map has had 132 Pageviews, with 87 Unique Pageviews and is now the leading content of the past 30 days. This page averaged 4 minutes and 52 seconds before jumping the original map on Google Maps; with a Bounce rate of 67%. That Bounce rate means 33% looked at other maps on the web site.

   Between 10% and 30% of the students continue to return on a regular basis 24 days after the initial contact. Being a retired marketing manager, I consider this to be an interesting test of the value of interactive maps of historic events as a teaching tool.

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