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Rain forests around the world--safari   Two teachers share their experience creating a Rain Forest Safari at their school using QTVR.   By Sandra Cameron and Mary Goddard

or several years the Sixth Grade team at Plattsmouth Community Middle School in Plattsmouth, Nebraska has taught an interdisciplinary unit on the rain forest. For the culminating activity the class goes to the Henry Doorly Zoo's Lied Jungle in Omaha, Nebraska. Every year there have been students who cannot go on the field trip. What could we do to allow these students experience the Lied Jungle from school?

Sony Mavica FD-7 camera

e discovered that using QuickTime Virtual Reality (QTVR) movies, the scenes of the jungle could be duplicated on the computer. With the cooperation of the zoo's educational curator, we were given access to the Lied Jungle before opening. Using a Sony Mavica FD-7, a Kaidan tripod head, and a tripod we took pictures of the animals and plants of the rain forest. The Mavica was mounted to the tripod head to take panoramic pictures. To mount the camera onto the tripod head, we had to center the lens of the camera over the tripod. If the camera was not centered, the pictures would not have overlapped to make the panoramic QTVR movies. Leveling the tripod head was tricky. The sidewalks in the jungle were dirt paths or sloped concrete.

he Kaidan tripod head is specially made for taking panoramic pictures. The Kaidan head has a disc that stops the camera every 18 degrees. To make one panoramic movie you must take 21 pictures sequenced around the tripod. After taking the pictures we used the program Quick Time Authoring Studio to stitch the pictures together into a QTVR movie.

Primate photo taken at the Lied Jungle.

ack at school, we created HyperStudio stacks that had factual information (Genus/Species, Class, Order, Family, Range, Adaptations, Social Behavior, Reproduction/Young, Feeding Type/Diet, Status, and Special Notes) about each of the flora and fauna found in the Lied Jungle. We placed a picture of the plant or animal on each page to accompany the facts. Next we created hypertext links that allowed students to look up words that they did not understand as well as links to show the student the part of the world that the plant or animal came from.

he next step was to create slideshows of still photos to entice the learner into further exploration of the stacks. We created two stacks for each separate part of the jungle (example, Asia). One stack was targeted for younger learners while the other stack was to be used by middle school learners. Each stack had the links for definitions and maps. Sounds of the rain forest were included in the stacks to give the impression of being there. This way students were able to get a feel for the jungle from school.

Waterfall at the Lied Jungle.

fter visiting the zoo--in reality or virtually, the sixth grade students developed a Rain Forest Safari for first graders using learning stations. First grade students were read a story about the rain forest. They sampled food products and graphed their likes and dislikes, listened to music, made a small terrarium, and viewed a slideshow about the rain forest from the HyperStudio Stacks.        To prepare for their journey to the rain forest jungle, the first grade students needed to make safari hats and binoculars. The safari hats were made with a band of paper around the head and the shape of a Panama hat stapled to the front of the band. The binoculars were made by gluing two toilet paper rolls together and hanging them around the student's necks with string. The students came dressed with these materials to the Rain Forest Safari. After the safari, the primary teachers were able to take the Elementary HyperStudio stacks back to the classroom to further their students' knowledge about the rain forest.

verall, project was a great success! The QTVR movies and HyperStudio stacks worked well within the school's network. The sixth grade students were excited by the QTVR movies and the still pictures. They were eager to learn how to make their own movies. The students have applied the QTVR technology by creating their own stacks in other subject areas.        Although the project was successful within our school's network, trying to share this project with other school districts through the World Wide Web has not been successful. The HyperStudio stacks were too large. They needed Netscape to have 20 or more megabytes of RAM to successfully load one stack. In spite of this challenge, we believe this technology has great potential for enhancing many subject areas. Schools can now take advantage of the growing number of resources on the Web that utilize QTVR.

Sandra Cameron and Mary Goddard are educators from Plattsmouth, Nebraska. Teacher Testimony authors are nominated by people like you. Send nominations to the editor. © 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000 SCR*TEC.   This page is Bobby Approved.