Guilty Pleasure: Videosharing

Introduction
I remember as a little girl our neighbor having the only Television set that I knew of and how lucky we were to be allowed to watch a half hour show once per week.

Today it seems we have unlimited opportunities to watch videos (t.v.) at our leisure. Not only can we watch any number of videos but we can now make our very own and share them with the rest of the world if we like.

For someone who grew up in a time when televisions were owned by very few people and watching T.V. wasn't an every day event videosharing tools are a guilty pleasure.






About the video: I love watching the men's grass dancers at powwows.

Reflections on the Process of Learning About the Tool
I am still shaking my head and saying, "That was incredibly easy." Using Flickr last week must have prepared me to embed videos from YouTube into a blog. It was essentially the same process to embed a video into a blog as it was to embed a slide show into a blog.

Using a video sharing site such as YouTube,and other video sharing sites such as http://www.howstuffworks.com/, http:// http://www.discoverychannel.com/ and TeacherTube is incredibly easy. They were all user friendly and easy to navigate.

The How Stuff Works site has very good content with a wide variety of videos as does Discovery Channel. I found Teacher Tube to be lacking in content and variety.
YouTube, has a huge variety but initially I found it difficult to find good content.

The Related Videos feature helped . This tool on YouTube shows a number of other videos related to your search topic.

The text comment feature in YouTube can also be useful. I followed the "How to make a mummy" link from the article 100 Best YouTube Videos for Teachers at Smart Teaching.org.

For that video there were 182 comments posted. Comments included corrections on which organs were to be removed and which ones were to stay in the body. The video wasn't intended to be totally accurate but, it was entertaining and the comments could be used to further investigate the mummification process.

What I am finding odd with YouTube is the YouTube page changed slightly after I signed up. This made it difficult to navigate around in it after getting used to the page that wasn't customized for me. The page seems to be too big and doesn't fit onto my screen and now I have to do much more scrolling than before.


My Personal Learning
My personal learning journey didn't take me as far and as wide as Flickr, the photosharing site, did in terms of actually learning about the videosharing tools.

What I found to be really interesting working with these sites and especially YouTube is my guilt at looking at videos online. It felt like I wasn't working when I was viewing videos.

The guilt must come from the television era. Did I just say "era" like the age of television is over?

Some of the guilt for watching and working with videosharing, I believe, comes partly from years of limiting my children's television time and to this day trying to regulate the T.V. watching for my husband and grown children. It also comes, I think, from growing up in a time of limited access to television, yet watching videos on-line can be such fun and convenient.



Teaching and Learning with videosharing
Doug Johnson's Blue Skunk Blog titled "Do U U Tube?" convinced me for the most part about the value of YouTube. Many of his readers, most of whom seem to work in education, of his blog agreed with the one reader who stated, "The number of invaluable resources available on YouTube outweigh the "junk".


I was fully convinced of the educational value of YouTube and other videosharing sites after I read the article, YouTube in the Science Classroom by Jerry Everhart (ProQuest Database). His article discussed some of his experiences and ideas for using this "dynamic" tool in the science classroom. His article related some very basic but essential reminders when using videos or any other media with students such as it is imperative the teacher view each video closely and in its entirety.


Having limited experience with YouTube and other videosharing sites I was unaware of the possibilities of its use in education.

I have always struggled with teaching of the research process but with the videos on The Research Process from the University of P.E.I. on YouTube the teaching of it may get easier.


I think there are many more opportunities yet to be discovered with videosharing including tips from public speaking videos for my public speaking club and sharing the Sign Language Lessons from Expert Village on YouTube with the teacher of a deaf student.

Conclusion
Videosharing tools can be an invaluable tool for teaching and learning. They can be used to teach everything from how to tie a necktie to how to cut hair. They also can be used to share your knowledge and expertise with others.


My guilt of using videosharing sites such as YouTube will just have to be worked through.





About the Video: The three young men dancing are from Peguis. Jigging is quite popular in our community as it is in many of the First Nations in Central and Northern Manitoba.