English learners the world over are turning to the Internet for resources. For example, The popular JenniferESL Channel on YouTube gets 40,000 hits per day. The pretty host, Jennifer Lebedev, herself a former ESL student from Russia, facilitated a discussion session where participants shared the pros and cons of using instructional video for teaching and material writing online. The mode of video is particularly suitable for explicitly teaching vocabulary and idioms as well as showing common mistakes. Jennifer's video lessons are so popular because they are:
- authentic and approachable
- free
- creative and engaging
- inspiring
- original
- always available
- very visible
- down-to-earth.
Nevertheless, a point that Jennifer kept making is that since we are content experts and we know pedagogy, there is no reason for us not to package what we do best differently (e.g. by means of instructional videos, audio podcasts, and blogs) and deliver it online.
Click here and here for two handouts supplied by Jennifer.
How to make a video from scratch? I attended a half-day workshop given by a very experienced group of technology-using teachers.
David Smith of Ohio University opened by emphasizing the need for storyboarding, which does not require the skills of an artist, however. In fact, he claimed that we can use storyboarding as an activity itself to teach prewriting, improving organization, analyzing a film, etc.
He recommended http://dvplace.com/ for information about video editing and production as well as making tutorials.
Next, Peter Vahle of OxfordTEFL, Spain, covered several necessary aspects regarding video production equipment. He said that if you go to YouTube and type in "(whatever) tutorial," you will find anything. But the quality may be too poor. Therefore, we should avoid the pitfalls of easy mistakes like poor sound quality. However, we don't need high-end equipment. A basic home video camera such as Canon FS200 is just fine. But we need at least one other microphone than the built-in camera mic. Peter advocated the use of video as a class project. Have students show a cool way to teach something, he said. Incidentally, from his extensive overseas travel experiences, Peter also shared a very interesting new meaning of blended learning: learn two things at the same time, for example, learn piano and English.
Laura Lau of the Petroleum Institute, UAE, then demonstrated how to use Microsoft Movie Maker to edit videos. Her helpful booklet is here.
Robert Elliot of the University of Oregon kept everyone on the Desktop and talked about screencasts as video. He shared a definition: screenshot + movie clip = screencasts. Screencasts are ideal for creating tutorials for procedures that are very repetitious, for example, a language lab login procedure. He compared the pros and cons of three screencasting software programs: Quicktime (free), Jing (basic version free), and Snapz Pro (annual subscription). A more comprehensive comparison of such software is here.
Katharina Schuhmann of SUNY wrapped up the session, which was sponsored by Video and Digital Media Interest Section (VDMIS) of TESOL, with her talk about Ning and Twitter. Her handout is here.
(To be continued.)
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