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With 48 hours of video uploaded every minute and 3 billion videos watched every day, YouTube has come a long way since one of the site’s co-founders, Jawed Karim, uploaded the first video of himself talking about elephants at the zoo almost 7 years ago.
So many videos, so little time.
In those 7 years, however, YouTube has grown into one of the best destinations for online learning out there. Although there is a time and place for the double rainbows, Justin Biebers and Rebecca Blacks of the Internet – even Cookie Monster in the Library has his place – YouTube has a lot more to offer. YouTube can be a tool to supplement your learning goals online and, at no cost, continue your educational endeavors. You just have to know where to look to find the good stuff.
From the world’s largest library of online videos, here are several of the best YouTube channels for librarians. These channels can help librarians to further educate themselves on the tons of information available on YouTube and further curate the infinite knowledge the world produces daily.
Mashable: Mashable is the go-to destination for social media-oriented tech news on the Internet. When it comes to video, Mashable’s YouTube channel delivers current events, trends, introductions to new cutting edge technology, and how-to videos about the most popular sites and products. With Mashable you can be sure you are getting the news and information the minute it comes out, like this Spotify tutorial that came out the day of the product update that shows you how to use the new embeddable Spotify player for your website. Plus, Mashable’s Media Summit is the preeminent resource for tech trends and their predicted impact on the everyday commerce that affects us all.
Lifehacker: We’ve got a lot on our plates when it comes to managing our digital lives and balancing events in the real world. Lifehacker helps you manage the two, while showing you efficiency tips to expedite the whole process. From videos about how to automate everything to general tips that teach you to work better, not harder, Lifehacker embraces the chaotic nature of the tech world and shows you how best to marry it with your everyday life.
TED talks: Yes, it’s common knowledge by now that TED is the place to go for some of the most inspiring video content on the Internet. Still, TED makes this list out of its tireless commitment to expanding our minds. While you can revisit the TED classics like architect Joshua Prince-Ramus’s talk on designing the Seattle Central Library, you can also keep up-to-date with the latest in technological advances with videos like Jack Choi demonstration on how a virtual dissection table works.
TEKHD: TEKHD, or TEKzilla is one of the most popular tech channels on YouTube. With smart, punchy and entertaining videos, it’s easy to ingest their information at a junk food-rate. The channel produces helpful, cutting edge tips everyday, such as this video on how to make your Twitter into an RSS feed. Their most popular videos are product walkthroughs and reviews, like this video about the newest Toshiba laptop with head tracking technology for glasses-free 3D. While many companies and online publications claim to be on top of the trends, TEKHD is at all the newest trade shows and conferences to keep you on top of all the latest updates and breakthroughs.
Create Customized Channels: You can filter and sort the content from YouTube into recommended videos with a site called Frequency. The site delivers the best videos to you based on what’s popular among the public, your Facebook friends, and your Twitter followers. You can follow channels and highlight certain videos to build a custom YouTube viewing experience. One of my favorite filters on Frequency is the How-To section that pulls in the best instructional content on YouTube. Find the best recent videos without having to wade through all the spam and low-quality uploads.
How can you utilize these channels to supplement learning? Do you use other YouTube channels not mentioned in this list? You can leave your reactions and feedback, as well as personal opinions on YouTube, education and libraries in the comments below!
The annual Horizon Report has been published by the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) and the New Media Consortium (NMC). It profiles six new and emerging technologies which will impact education over the coming years. Here’s a brief recap of their findings:
“Challenge-based learning (CBL) is similar to problem-based learning, but with CBL, students formulate the challenges they will address. Through a process of discussion and research, students identify a selection of questions that might be workable for their project, work on solutions, and publish those solutions online. In this way, CBL provides the satisfaction that comes from figuring out both the issue to be tackled and the solution to it…”
As usual, the quick reference resource answers the following questions:
What is it?
How does it work?
Who’s doing it?
Why is it significant?
What are the downsides?
Where is it going?
What are the implications for teaching and learning?
The folks at Educause have put together a new “7 Things” guide, this time describing 7 Things You Should Know About First-Generation Learning Analytics. “Broadly speaking, analytics programs evaluate large data sets to provide decision makers with information that can help determine the best course of action for an organization. Learning analytics (LA) takes this same approach but with the specific goal of improving learning outcomes, which could be measured by grades, retention, or completion.” As usual, the quick reference resource answers the following questions:
What is it?
How does it work?
Who’s doing it?
Why is it significant?
What are the downsides?
Where is it going?
What are the implications for teaching and learning?
“I was at a point in my career where I learned that red tape and bureaucracy aren’t always what get things done. So I got involved in the more subversive side of my profession—attending unconference-type events and finding different learning opportunities for librarians. These opportunities weren’t created by professional organizations but were created by librarians for other librarians to help us on the front lines. After attending and planning a couple of unconferences, I realized there wasn’t much information out there about them, especially in paper format.”
Sarah Kessler at Mashable recommends 5 Best Practices for Educators on Facebook. This useful article gathers tips and suggestions from teachers on how to effectively use Facebook in the classroom. Here are the best practices discussed:
Method, Inc. writes for UX Magazine about the development of a community-based video website community for K-12 teachers and the challenges faced in its design. Facilitating Effortless Discovery of Content for Teaching brings up some excellent points with regard to developing content-rich websites, many of which could be applied to library websites as well as educational ones, such as:
“For a content-heavy site, the primary search model should be questioned and rethought to best surface content for the user”
Social Media guru Chris Brogan writes Educators – Google Plus Is For You. This quick post discusses 4 different ways that Google+ can be used in education. Here are his recommendations:
Sarah Kessler at Mashable identifies 7 Ways Universities Are Using Facebook as a Marketing Tool. This interesting article looks at the study done earlier this year at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth which asked a representative sample of U.S. schools whether they use some social media, 100% of them said they did. These are the ways that those universities are leveraging Facebook:
Dan Klamm, Marketing & Communications Coordinator at Syracuse University Career Services, writes for Mashable about 3 Tips for Teachers Using Social Media in the Classroom. These are great guidelines for educators who want to use social media effectively while maintaining professional boundaries. This thoughtful article is divided into the following sections:
W. Gardner Campbell, Director of Professional Development and Innovative Initiatives in the Division of Learning Technologies at Virginia Tech shares his advice to ‘Narrate, Curate, Share’: How Blogging Can Catalyze Learning on the Campus Technology blog. This is a thought-provoking article which addresses many of the questions potential bloggers have about the medium.
“As I talk at colleges and universities across the country about the blogging initiatives I’ve led at the University of Mary Washington, Baylor University, and now at Virginia Tech, my audiences consistently ask about several issues. FERPA is one. Grading is another. But the fundamental questions have to do with the nature and value of the activity itself. What is blogging? Is it like an online journal? If so, how is a public journal of academic value? Should I give my students prompts? Will they think this is merely busy work? Should their blogs be about work done in specific classes, work done in several classes, work done outside of class, or all of the above?”
David Escalante, Director of Computer Policy & Security at Boston College and Andrew J. Korty, Deputy Information Security Officer at Indiana University write for Educause Review about Cloud Services: Policy and Assessment. This excellent article discusses how to assess the risks of hosting institutional data with cloud providers. The article is organized into the following topic areas:
Data Held by Third Parties
Organizing for Third-Party Management
Criteria for Reviewing Third-Party Products and Services
Rachel Wiseman at the Chronicle of Higher Education’s Wired Campus blog writes about the Top 10 YouTube Videos Posted by Colleges, and What They Mean. This interesting article discusses which college videos have been the most successful and why. One of the top videos which made the list features a new book-retrieval system at the University of Chicago’s library.
The folks at the Online Degree blog have put together this mega-list of 100 Essential Web 2.0 Tools for Teachers. These useful applications are organized into the following categories:
The folks at Educause have put together a new “7 Things” guide, this time discussing 7 Things You Should Know About LMS Evaluation. “For most institutions, the LMS is the most significant enterprise application for teaching and learning. It serves as the resource hub for the institution’s classes and delivers courseware to students.” As usual, the quick reference resource answers the following questions:
What is it?
How does it work?
Who’s doing it?
Why is it significant?
What are the downsides?
Where is it going?
What are the implications for teaching and learning?
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