Documentary Resource for the Classroom

Snag Films is website that provides free access to thousands of documentaries and independent films. Some of the films are published by well-known documentary makers and others are first timers. Snag allows for free viewing and sharing of all of their published videos. The videos can be saved to a widget that can be published on your blog, website or wiki.



Snag recently released an additional site called Snag Learning. Here is a snippet from their site:

"SnagLearning features carefully selected films from SnagFilms’ award-winning library of over 1,600 documentaries that are appropriate for students from middle school and up. Our titles cover nearly every classroom subject and many are produced by well-known educational sources, including PBS and National Geographic. The goal of this site is to highlight documentaries that make for engaging educational tools. We will also feature guest teacher bloggers as well as special programming stunts like Q&As with the filmmakers.

Teachers can submit and share their own lesson plans, quizzes and homework ideas with fellow educators. The commenting area on each film page functions as public forum to share and discuss."
Snag Films and Snag Learning are both excellent resources for the classroom. They are great conversation starters. They can also be used to spark a writing assignment or any online discussion forum.  Snag Learning provides a list of guiding discussion questions for each film. As we introduce digital storytelling in the classroom, we can use these documentaries and examples and topic starters.


 

Student learning on demand with over 1000 targeted math and science tutorials

Today I was introduced to a fabulous website called Khan Academy. The address of the site is http://www.khanacademy.org.  Khan Academy hosts over 1000 math and science video tutorials.  All of the videos are categorized and hosted on Youtube.  Here is a quote from their site

"We have 1000+ videos on YouTube covering everything from basic arithmetic and algebra to differential equations, physics, chemistry, biology and finance which have been recorded by Salman Khan."

The videos provide a very easy to follow explanation of basic and advanced topics. Salman explains these concepts in a manner that is attractive to students.  Each video is supplemented by software that dynamically generates exercises and captures data on student usage and progress. You can read this document to understand the vision of this site and to review student and teacher feedback.

Another highlight on this site is the SAT review. Khan works out every problem found in a common SAT study guide. This is a free SAT study guide with step by step video tutorials!

This site is a tremendous resource for students and teachers. The tutorials can be integrated into lessons, posted on Moodle pages, linked to teacher web pages or provided to students for review. The tutorials have proven to be an effective tool for special education students. Teachers may decide to incorporate these videos in center activities in the elementary school. I could also envision these tutorials added to a Glog.

I hope you enjoy this resource. I welcome your comments on this post and would love to hear your feedback or implementation experiences regarding this resource.

Enjoy!

100 Best Youtube Videos for Educators

I came across this listing of the 100 best youtube videos for eductators and wanted to share it with everyone. As we all know, youtube.com is blocked in our schools for many reasons. Did you know that you can download youtube videos from your computer at home for free! My favorite resource to do this is www.keepvid.com . All you have to do is

1. Find the video you like on youtube.


2. Copy the URL address of the vidoe.


3. Go to www.keepvid.com


4. Past the URL of the video into the URL bar at the top of the page and click download.


5. You will be prompted to download the video.


6. You can then bring the video to school on a flash drive.


7. You can play the video from your computer, insert it into a powerpoint or smart  notebook project.

Here is the link to the 100 best youtube videos for educators. Enjoy!

http://www.classroom20.com/profiles/blogs/649749:BlogPost:177332