We knew it was bound to happen. According to a recent study, more teens than ever are spending hour upon hour each day watching YouTube. In fact, for the first time ever, YouTube has edged out cable TV as one of their most watched platforms. I can't say I blame them. YouTube is completely on-demand entertainment. It's what you want and when you want it. And, with all of the momentum YouTube is gaining, it's no wonder that more and more teachers are turning to YouTube in the classroom. It is a great way to engage students and meet them where they already are. So let's up our YouTube game. Let's up the fun . And let's up the transformational power of video with these 4 must-have YouTube tools: 4 Must-Have YouTube Tools TubeChop Have you ever showed a video to your class, but realized later that the whole video wasn't really necessary? That you only needed to share a short clip? With TubeChop, there's no more sitting through irrelevant content and no more having to spend valuable class time fast forwarding or rewinding in order to find the perfect part. TubeChop brings you the exact content you want on your terms by allowing you to pull a clip from an existing YouTube video and creating its own link to share with your class. AdBlock Plus Do you know those annoying commercials that start off popular YouTube videos? The ones that last for what seems like 30 minutes completely stalling your momentum and letting the air out of your lesson? Adblock plus gets rid of those annoying commercials once and for all. No more sitting and waiting for the commercial to end or listening to student giggles as a semi-inappropriate commercials starts off your educationally sound YouTube content. (Although, maybe there is something to be said for commercials and engagement. I once had a group of eighth grade boys completely mesmerized by what I was showing after a lead-in by a Victoria's Secret Runway show ad!) Adblock plus gets rid of those ads and gets your students watching the content you want right away. GIFit! Perhaps you wanted to add a looping set of directions to show students how to do something new. Or maybe you just wanted to create a looping reminder of an important concept. GIFit! allows you to pull out a few seconds of any YouTube video and create a never-ending loop of content. You can then insert this GIF into a doc, slide or anywhere else where you want put digital content in order to give your students a visual and extra reinforcement. Video Grabby Have you ever had those moments in class where you plan to show a YouTube video only to find that the Internet is down? You know those moments where you've had an amazing lesson plan, but because of a silly tech issue, you were forced to move onto Plan B. With video grabby, no more having to resort to that alternate plan. Video grabby allows you to download YouTube videos so that you do not need an Internet connection to access them.
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It’s the beginning of a new unit and you created a Google Form to collect information about what the students already know about a topic. You step back and take a look at your masterpiece, and realize that this Form is just too good not to share. You add your department friends as collaborators to the Form (because sharing is caring!), shoot them a quick email, and ask them to make a copy before distributing the link. Feeling proud, you share the link to the form with your students and watch as they jump on to give you the information you need. This is going to revolutionize your instruction! At the end of the day, you go to the Form results excited to look at the fruits of your labor. You stare at the page completely dumbfounded. Names of students who are not in your class taunt you from the page. Your spreadsheet is a complete and total mess. How did this happen? Your friends were supposed to make a copy before distributing the link! Surely they didn’t post your link to their own Classrooms... Oh, no... Sound familiar? Wouldn’t it be great if there was an easy way to send a form to a friend and force him to make his own copy to avoid the dreaded spreadsheet highjack? With this simple hack, you can feel safe to share with friends and keep your results private and meaningful. Click HERE for the complete tutorial. |
AuthorJennifer Fischer is a former middle school English teacher, full-time instructional coach, and part-time edtech nerd, who strives to help next JENeration educators transform learning for all students.
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