The folks Google have a wonderful website for SketchUp which includes several excellent, FREE tutorials. You should check out these tutorials because they are extremely helpful and easy to follow. Make sure you plug in your headphones or computer speakers because each tutorial is narrated by a real person. You can pause the tutorials along the way to try out the different techniques. Even the basic tutorials are useful because you can never learn enough shortcuts and time-saving techniques! You can also download a free preview version (good for 8 hours of design time) of SketchUp as well as free components libraries. Awesome!

www.sketchup.com

In particular, please watch the "Getting Started with SketchUp" tutorial. It's a little over 15 minutes long, but well worth it.

Here's tutorial about how to build a model and export it to Google Earth. Note: You have to BEGIN in Google Earth, and THEN move to Sketchup and back to Google Earth. How to build a model in Google Earth

The tutorial on our class website is meant to be an introduction to SketchUp. As you become more comfortable with its basic functions, push yourself to explore the ways that it can aid your design process and also the ways you present your ideas to others. Go forth and create!