I spent the first part of this week with about 80 students in Northern Wisconsin. We study the flora and fauna in the Northwoods at the University of Wisconsin's Treehaven Campus. I spend most of my time at Bearskin Creek. Part of our exploration involves identifying Benthic Macroinvertebrates as indicator species.
We have some great dichotomous keys and are pretty practiced at identifying most of the critters, but every once in a while we run into something we've never seen and can't id on the spot. While some great apps help identify plants (PlantSnap and PictureThis), we've never found anything that can reliably help us identify insects on the spot.
Today I discovered Google Lens and tested it out on some of my photos from the trip. It works great! It takes just a moment to scan the image and then up pops names, images, and links to learn more.
Right now the stand-alone app is only available on Android Devices, but Google Lens is built into the Google Photos App and the Google App on iOS.
There are also some other cool features that I have not explored yet, including the landmark scan. You can learn more about Google Lens here.
How could you use this resource with your students in creative ways?
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