YouTube As A Source Of Knowledge

YouTube As A Source Of Knowledge

YouTube is a great entertaining website containing materials on almost any topic: psychology, health, sports, music, cinema, etc. You can find out the latest political news, consider conspiracy theories, see some painful-looking accidents, track fashion trends, watch funny cat videos or performances of stand-up artists. All this is fun, but many academics are rather skeptical about YouTube, believe that sitting for hours in front of a computer and watching videos distracts young people for learning, creates a fertile soul for laziness and underperformance.

In fact, the educational potential of this online platform is deeply underestimated. Experts from Pro-Papers have analyzed the ways how YouTube can be used in a classroom and described them below. Educators should try these methods to make their lessons more efficient, interesting, and interactive.

Trigger discussions

When professors want learners to discuss certain personalities, phenomena, important events, scenes from fiction literature, they should make an introduction to a topic, provide basic information. The easiest way to do it is playing thematic videos. It may be useful to show the same story interpreted by several news stations and allow students to compare facts, distinguish motifs of different parties. It is a great way to hone analytical skills and critical thinking.

Provide how-to instructions

It is convenient to have video instruction at hand if a person works with a professor in a class and has to repeat an experiment at home. If forgetting some steps and having no opportunity to consult an educator, viewing a recording would be a great solution.

There are many video bloggers explaining how certain things should be done, helping viewers to acquire practical experience. Also, professors create such videos self-handedly, upload them to YouTube and share links with learners. Universities can have their own video channels and copy educational materials to an official website.

Use clips from documentaries

Large broadcasters like Channel 4 and BBC often publish short fragments from documentary films on their YouTube pages. You can use these videos to visualize a topic considered in a class, attract students’ attention, and diversify a boring textual content.

Videos as archive resources

There are many videos created in the 20th century and published on the Internet now. You can use such footage to contextualize historical topics, allow students to listen to speeches of prominent personalities of that time, show what your city looked like several decades ago, and ensure deep immersing in a considered epoch.

Create playlists

Once you register on YouTube, it is possible to create playlists with favorite materials. It would be easy to find necessary videos when preparing for lectures and categorize them depending on topics.

Reach visual learners

Far not all students like to read textbooks. It may be rather challenging for some of them to imagine abstract concepts. Each good educator knows that there should be multiple teaching approaches to satisfy everyone’s needs. Learners should have the opportunity to choose the most suitable course materials. Statistics show that many students want to watch videos in a class, as well as get information via other multimedia channels.

YouTube As A Source Of Knowledge

Extending the educational process

Students grasp information differently. Someone needs additional teaching time to understand challenging theories, while somebody performs academic assignments faster than others and feels boring. Since professors have busy schedules, they cannot consult each student, determine one’s knowledge level and hold private lessons.

YouTube satisfies the needs of all young people, regardless of their learning speed. If some details of a professor’s explanation remain unclear, students may watch more detailed videos to explore a topic profoundly, make a pause to take notes and comprehend information received. Hyperactive and curious students doing better than their peers may study additional content, find out more interesting facts, always stay engaged and not be limited by classmates. As a result, everyone comes to a class with a theoretical base sufficient for moving to the next topic.

Ask students to make their own videos

Recording, editing, and playing videos in front of the class is very fun and exciting. Such activities turn educational routine into an entertainment, allow young people to develop creative talents, teach them to present their thoughts in a bright and accessible form, persuade an audience. Experience gained may come in handy when preparing video resumes, advertising student startups and communicating with people in real life.

Even if there are no tablets and cameras in your educational institution, almost every modern student has a smartphone with video recording functions. Also, there are many editing apps which may be downloaded for free and used prior to uploading materials to YouTube.

READ: 9 Tips Indians Need to Be Happy Before Moving Abroad

Demonstrative experiments

If a university does not have lab equipment necessary to conduct some expensive or dangerous experiment, it is worth finding someone who has already done in on YouTube.

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