Notes from presentation on United Streaming, 31 Oct. '06

The usefulness of United Streaming is demonstrated once you understand the "power" of using short video segments.
Using short segments:Create a video library
What reasons are there to use a video in class?survival, take up timefinish gradingprogress reports duetest in class yesterdayIt's Fridayi.e., these are the bad reasons
Why really is streaming video worthwhile?Enhances understanding and retentionEngages and motivates studentsSwitching from VHS, to digital increases the flexibility of using video clipsKey strategy for integrating video: short segments
What is Visual Literacy?According to Wikipedia:"Visual literary is the set of skills involved in the interpretation and criticism of images. The concept of visual literary is also the ability to create/use images to communicate. Visual literacy is a field of study in academia, drawing on art history, criticism, etc."
Website interfaceCosmeo is a homework helper for which parents can subscribe at $9.99 a month. This helper can be used by up to 4 students. Perhaps most importantly, this can be a fundraising activity by the feeder schools. Parents can get up to 25% of their money returned.
Learning Adds Up: is the site at cosmeo.com.90% of the content is not created by Discovery but is purchased. The video segments are divided into clips that are analogous to chapters and paragraphs as in a book.
Some of the videos are modifiable, thus, they can be incorporated and re-used for student editing. In fact, this adding to, and editing feature is a component of what analysts are now describing as a crucial to Web 2.0 (Cf. http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html).
There is closed captioning in the streaming for challenged students.
The BI on United is that science and health are United's strengths, their major competitor, PowerMediaPlus, is strongest in Language, Social Studies, and Business.
A person using the streaming makes links and saves to: “My Content.”
Webinars are available for participants.
From the Teaching area, a student can access the writing center to take online quizzes:www.unitedstreaming.com/studentcentercode: randomly generated according to the quiz that is built.The student enters: first and last name with a space.