YouTube

  I've been playing around a lot more with YouTube as an educational tool this month.  We all know how much fun it can be to watch silly, crazy, or downright scary videos that random people all over the world post to this site. However, YouTube is so much more than that. For years I've been using the site to find great educational videos to use in my classroom.  However, these past few weeks I've been able to organize them into different playlists that clearly organizes my favorites.  My students can access my channel and watch different videos, and they are even beta testing a chance for us to create online quizzes directly linked to the videos on our channels.  How awesome is that? I did sign up to be part of the beta test, but have had some difficulty getting it to work just yet. However, I am extremely excited to get it to work so that the students can benefit from this amazing tool.
  In the mean time I have been using Blubbr, a new site that I just learned about, that allows you to use YouTube videos to create trivia or quizzes with short video clips.  For example, I just created one using different clips about states of matter.  It was my first trial quiz, but basically it shows a 20 second clip and then asks the student a question. It gives immediate feedback before showing another 20 second clip where you can either show the answer to the previous question or give information for the next one.  I can't wait to play around more with this site. It just creates such an engaging way for twenty-first century students to learn in the medium that they are so accustomed.
   If you haven't had a chance to really play around with all that YouTube has to offer, besides the silly videos that go viral, you should take a minute to check it out. It truly has become a forward thinking website.