Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Teachers' TV!

This posting is a continuation of the previous one about using online video...

teacher's tv
http://www.teachers.tv/

This is quite an exciting find! Teachers' TV has over a thousand online video programs (or programmes as these Brits would have it) on K-12 teacher professional development topics.

The first one I watched was:
Internet Research and Podcasting
http://www.teachers.tv/video/3207
This episode covers webquests and podcasting as used in secondary classrooms. Plus a number of excellent tech tips--for example, an elementary teacher says she has her students turn off their monitors when they are supposed to be paying attention to her in the computer lab.

The streaming was pretty darn slow, even with my broadband connection from the university, so I'd suggest downloading these very professionally produced Windows Media and Qucktime files (it seems you have to register to download the files, though you can view them without registering; registration is free). They also sell DVDs of some shows.

This episode was, of course, about teaching with technology. However, the majority of these videos are not about teaching with technology, but instead range all over the K-12 age range and content areas.

Other examples:
Body Image for Beginners
http://www.teachers.tv/video/4888
Much of this one is teachers talking about the subject, but it also features fascinating but kinda saddening clips from interviews from fifth-grade students who are already quite aware that they are "too fat" or "too freckled."

KS1 Literacy: Laying the Foundations 2
http://www.teachers.tv/video/220
in this video, an experienced teacher describes and shows a Vygotsky-based approach to early language and literacy learning. The fact that you can actually see what she is talking about in action in the classroom really makes this video useful.

The site is well-constructed. You can bookmark the various videos you are interested in (important when there are so many), and it keeps track of recently viewed videos so you can easily find them.

But that's not all.... (Like they say in the late-night infomercials.) When you visit this site, you also get

InClass tv
http://www.teachers.tv/inclasstv

This, a subsite of teachers.tv, hosts a collection of videos for showing to students, again ranging all over the K-12 curriculum. Of course, some kids may have problems at time understanding the English accents.

The home page highlights videos on math (or maths), PE and social studies.

All in all, a tremendous source of videos for K-12 teachers!

Chris

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Integrating Online Video Into Your Teaching

Incorporating Online Video Into Your Teaching

If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words is a video clip worth? Already, if you're like most teachers, you have a few selected VHS or DVDs that you cue up to illustrate various points or concepts, incite student interest, start conversations, etc. Of course, you don't watch the whole 90 minute movie, you just show just that choice section. Many teachers are starting to create their own DVDs with just the video segments that they want to use in class, to avoid fumbling with a remote control in front of the students. But often, it is hard to find just the right clip from your personal video library or the school media center...and buying new tapes and DVDs...who has the budget for that?

Well, there is another option now, online streaming video clips. You have probably heard of YouTube, for example. A great source of videos of Chinese kids singing along to Backstreet Bouys songs and America's Worst Home Videos. But there is some educational content there if you search hard enough. And Ive found some sites below that provide educational clips, free of charge, over the Internet. If your classroom has a good broadband connection, you might well want to consider using clips from some of these sources in your teaching.

Video Sources

Google Video
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=genre:educational&so=1

YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/categories

These are the famous, hugely popular sites for finding online video clips. The vast majority, of course, of these clips aren't educational in nature. (Though Google at least has an Education category.) But, depending on u your subject, it's worth a look. One nice thing about Google Video is that you can download most clips instead of having to rely on a live internet connection--which is great for teachers. You'll know the clip is safely on your hard drive when you're presenting it to a classroom of kids. Of course, when searching these sites, be aware that there is a lot of "inappropriate" content. And your school may block the site as well, because of that and/or bandwidth issues.

AOL Video: Learning and Adventure
http://video.aol.com/video-category/learning-and-adventure/255?sem=1&ncid=AOLVID00170000000005
Quite a few videos here for use with K-12 students.

UnitedStreaming Video
http://www.unitedstreaming.com/
Claims to be "in more than half of US Schools". Could this be true? 40,000 video clips correlated to state standards. Try it free for 30 days.

ide@s
http://virage-prod.uwex.edu/vss-bin/vss_SR.exe/ideas/ideas_search

This site, from Wisconsin, has a database of 297 videoclips, each linked to state K-12 standards. Even if you're not from Wisconsin, you may find something useful here. I had some difficulty on my Mac, though, getting them to play.

Multimedia Seeds: Video Clips
http://eduscapes.com/seeds/clips.html
This page has a good list of sites that offer video clips in a range of content areas

Annenberg Media
http://www.learner.org/resources/browse.html

A wide variety of streaming videos for both K-12 and college instructors who are seeking to enhance their professional development. Many are targeted at K-12 teacher professional development such as "Essential Science for Teachers: Physical Sciences", "inside Writing Communities: Grades 3-5" and "In Search of the Novel." The latter covers how to teach 10 novels to high school students. Well worth checking out!

Resourses about Using Video in Your Teaching

(I wish I could find more of these...any suggestions?)

Seeing is Believing: Harnessing Online Video Clips to Enhance Learning
http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/profdev040.shtml
" Most teachers have come to understand that Net-Geners relate best to curriculum when teachers incorporate the medium that captivates them the most -- video -- to help translate abstract concepts or events into their reality."

Video Clips / Vodcasts for Online Literature Courses: The Allure of the Moving Image
http://elearnqueen.blogspot.com/2006/10/video-clips-vodcasts-for-online.html
For those of you considering creating your own video clips, whether for an online course or face-to-face, here are some good guidelines to follow. The "E-Learning Queen" focuses on content here, not technical issues, which makes this particularly useful, I think. Has examples of clips.

Would love to add on to these lists. Feel free to share suggestions via comments.

Chris

Monday, November 06, 2006

Episode 15: (Digital Video Analysis) is Online!

Episode 15 Now Available!

Hello again!

The Instructional Consulting Office is pleased to announce that "Teach with Tech" Episode 15 is now available for your listening pleasure. This podcast episode is entitled "Digital Video Analysis." This episode features an interview with Jon Tapp, the Director of Computer Services at the Vanderbilt University Kennedy Center for Research on Human Development. Jon is the developer of a program called ProcoderDV. ProcoderDV is designed for those doing reasearch requiring the analysis of digital video files, such as classroom interactions, counseling sessions, etc.

What is a podcast? A podcast is like a short radio show in digital format. You can download the mp3 audio file and play it on your computer, or put it on your iPod or similar digital audio player.

Episode 15 is available, as are all the previous episodes of "Teach with Tech", at http://www.indiana.edu/~icy/podcast/

You can subscribe to the series via iTunes by using this URL:

http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=87095475


Comments and questions welcomed!

Friday, November 03, 2006

Resources for Research Using Digital Video

Digital Video Analysis Resources

Here are some resources mentioned or alluded to during my interview with Jon Tapp in Episode 15:

Procoder's site, again
http://www.procoderdv.com

MOOSES (Multi-Option Observation System for Experimental Studies).
http://www.getmooses.com

INTMAN (Interval Manager for Windows and PocketPC)
http://www.getintman.com

The Kennedy Center for Research on Human Developments site with a link to Jon Tapp and his bio in the people section.
http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/

Many projects that use Procoder are about autism and fall under the research portion of the TRIAD autism group (Treatment and Research Institute for Autism Spectrum Disorder):
http://www.triadatvanderbilt.com.

The first ProcoderDV customer was this project at IU: Children's School Success. They have been going for a few years now:
http://css.crlt.indiana.edu/

Another group using it is the Early Language Learning Project:
http://www.comdis.wisc.edu/facstaff/sweismer/webpage.htm


If you have a research project using digital video (doesn't have to use Procoder), I'd be happy to highlight it here. Or you can add a link to it in the comments.

Cheers,
Chris

Episode 15: Analysis of Video Documents, My New Snowball

My "Rig"

In case you were wondering what my recording setup looks like, here it is. I've got a MacBook Pro and a Blue Snowball microphone. The Snowball is a new purchase; before that I was just using the microphone built into the laptop. This is the first episode recorded with the new microphone. For this episode, I used iChat, Apple's instant messaging tool to connect with my interview subject, and Garageband to record the session. When I clicked on the record button in GB, it announced that it saw that I had an audioconferencing session going, and asked if I wanted to record it. Then it put myself and my subject on individual tracks, allowing for adjustments to either side without affecting the other, and panning one person to the left, the other to the right for a stereo effect. The Blue microphone looks cool, don't you think? It requires the download of a firmware update in order to record podcasts, as it comes set up to record things at a louder volume, like musical instruments, but once you've installed the firmware update, it seems to work fine. The audio quality of iChat doesn't seem to be quite as good as Skype, which I have used in the past in conjunction with Audio Hijack to record the session--GB doesn't recognize that you are in a Skype session the way it does with iChat. But hopefully, the sound quality is good enough.

Episode 15: Video Analysis Software

Episode 15 has been recorded and may even be online before the day (Friday) is over. This episode features an interview, the first interview I have done with a software developer. This developer is also an educational researcher, which provides him with unique insights into the creation of his software package--he's a user as well as a developer. His name is Jon Tapp, from the Kennedy Center at Vanderbilt University, and he's the man behind ProcoderDV.

It seems like every semester, my office gets more and more requests to help faculty as they work with digital video. Sometimes the faculty member just wants to record a lecture, or capture an existing clip for use in a PowerPoint, but often the faculty member is involved in a research project that incorporates video documents of child behavior, classroom interactions or counseling sessions. Sometimes they have hours and hours of this sort of raw video data to process. Usually this involves identifying types of behavior and then noting when and for how long the behavior takes place. Doing this sort of analysis manually can be quite time-consuming and the resulting data hard to work with. But a tool like Procoder DV makes this type of qualitative data analysis much easier. Which is why I decided to interview Jon Tapp for Episode 15. I thought that many "Teach with Tech" listeners would be interested in hearing about this type of software. Let me know what you think. And if there are other pieces of education-related software that I should focus on, let me know.

Well, back to editing Episode 15. Thanks for reading this!

Chris