Todd's Tuesday Tech Tip #15: This Day in History

Dear Colleagues,

Today's T4 is a fun one.  It is called dMarie Time Capsule.  It is a really interesting tool to use to put things in perspective.  For example, I put in my birth date and was delighted to find a slew of things about the world on the day I was born. 

For example:  Gas was $0.35 gallon and a loaf of bread cost $0.23/ loaf.  The top song for that day was Everyday People by Sly and the Family Stone. 

Now, this might be fun for us to explore, but it could also be great for students to find out information.  If they are creating a story and they need to know costs, or other details about the setting, they could research a time and find actual data from that specific snapshot of time.  Students could make comparisons over time as well.  The time capsule has data going all the way back to 1800.  They do warn that the data for the older dates is somewhat spotty, but nonetheless it would be a great place to begin.

Start by going here:  http://dmarie.com/timecap/

Put in a date.

You then have a choice.  You can choose quick page or an advanced page.  The quick page generates a time capsule for you.  The advanced page lets you tailor the results specifically to what you would like to have.    Lastly, you can then print out a customized time capsule with only the data you want.

I could see this being fun in classrooms for birthday celebrations or maybe a way to integrate real data into a math exploration.

How do you think you might use it?

Thanks,
Todd