Wednesday, April 23, 2008

YouTube in the Classroom

I went to the CATESOL presentation by Nathan Crandall and Steve MacIsaac called, "Using YouTube in Speaking and Listening Classes." I've got to say that at first, I wasn't sure I'd get anything out of it because they were covering the very basics of YouTube - what is it? who posts videos on it? how do you find it? - all things that anyone from my generation would know. But, after all those questions had been answered (there were a lot of people who needed the basics, so it was important), I learned a few ways to use YouTube in the classroom, other than just cueing up some videos right before class. Here's a taste:

1.  You can make a YouTube account and save movies to it so that you don't have to worry about finding them before class. The movies will be safe in your account until they are taken off of YouTube all together.

2. Within your account, you can create and name playlists. Playlists can help you organize movies by class, topic, etc. 

3. You can create a contact list (your students). You can email these contacts the videos in your account by playlist- a great way to assign homework.

I created an account, but I haven't used it in class yet. It really is a hassle trying to find the video you found the night before while your students are coming in and class is starting. I think that even if the playlist and contact list isn't for you, the account is really helpful.  

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great post, Kate! You're right that it is frustrating to bring up something you found in time to get class started. We sometimes waste more time with technology than we save. What a good way to instantly access things you need. I think YouTube is a fascinating phenomenon and I'm wondering how SAL teachers are using it now. Anybody willing to share ideas?

Marianne said...

Thanks for the tip, Kate!

Sara said...

I also attended the session on "Using YouTube in speaking and listening classes" and found it to be useful in the same ways as Kate. Another thing I wanted to add was that posting on YouTube could be incorporated into a listening and speaking class as well. Students could record themselves giving a presentation or having a conversation then post it on YouTube. Then their videos could easily be shown in class or viewed only by the teacher to assess. I am looking forward to using YouTube more in my OC class. For now, I only use it to engage the students on a topic or as extra listening practice. The other day we were working on "News you can use" and I showed two news clips from YouTube. One was a report on how far Nintendo has come, and the other was a report on a recent shark attack. The students answered some comprehension and opinion questions after watching the videos. They seemed very interested in both videos. It is so fulfilling to engage my students by showing videos they can relate to. That is the main reason why I love using YouTube in the classroom.
--Sara