Web Based Courses in Manitoba

     On Thursday we had the opportunity to have Donald Girouard & Sophia Palahicky from Manitoba Education visit our class to discuss Web Based Courses. I personally never participated in a web based course when I went through the public school system but I know that I will be working with them in the future so I was interested in learning as much as possible.

     Manitoba Education currently has hundreds of distance learning resources which includes over 40 developed online courses that students can take at the Grade 9 through 12 levels. Since I am in a small rural area I anticipate that the primary reason for introducing web based courses would be due to course availability but I know students will be interested for a variety of reasons. Some reasons why students may take web based courses include:
1 ) Availability of courses/teachers
    - Especially in smaller schools, there may not be enough teachers or
      students to offer all course options every year or at all. Web based
      courses allow students to participate in these courses no matter what
      school they are attending.
2 ) Student choice
     - Some students may find that they are more engaged or are more able
       to learn through a web based course as opposed to a classroom setting.
       This allows students to work at a more flexible schedule where they can
       work ahead or take more time as needed.
     - Students may also find these options more suitable if they are not getting
       along with their peers or specific teachers due to any number of reasons.
3 ) Absence from school
     - Students may be unable to attend school due to involvement in
       extracurricular activities, illness, pregnancy, suspension, etc. Even though
       students may not be able to physically be on campus, web based courses
       allow them to still participate in the course and work towards their credits.
4 ) Enrichment/Remedial options
     - The availability of web based courses allows students to take enrichment
        courses at a higher level or make up for credits from a previous year. This
        lets our students work at a level that best suits them without having to be
        restricted by scheduling concerns.

     One thing that I had never thought of was that web based courses can be a great resource for teachers as well! Teachers, as well as pre-service teachers, can register and access all of the web based courses that are available on the Manitoba Education site even if they don't have students who are using them. Teachers can then see how the course is set up and organized, what examples are used, and access the included resources like video clips, audio clips, text and images. Where else can you find resources and unit plans that perfectly fit the Manitoba curriculum and that are designed by Manitoba Education? I think this would be especially helpful for teachers who are teaching a subject for the very first time or something that is out of their teaching area. Teachers can also use web based courses in their classroom in a blended approach that incorporates some of the online activities as well as classroom based activities. I'm thinking that this might be an easy first step if some teachers are interested in trying to incorporate a "flipped classroom" approach.

     Are you using any resources from web based courses in your classroom?

Resources To Start Off Your Week 55

     The time has finally come and I am officially in my last full week of classes at university! All that is left now are some final projects and presentations and then it is off to student teaching again! I am so excited to be back in the classroom and start applying for teaching jobs once they are posted. To help prepare for student teaching I found a great new Resource To Start Off The Week. As always, I will be adding this to my lists of resources under the Fav Websites heading.

Knowmia
- Knowmia is a great resource for teachers that hosts over 10,000 video lessons
  designed for classroom use. Teachers can search through videos by subject areas
  like English, Math and Social Studies as well as subcategories like Grammar,
  Algebra and Geography.
- Videos are created by teachers in the subject area and uploaded directly onto the
  site. Many of these videos are also available on YouTube through the teachers'
  individual accounts but by hosting the videos on Knowmia the ads and suggested
  videos lists (which are sometimes inappropriate) are eliminated. It is also perfect for
  schools or divisions that filter out YouTube on the school server.
- Knowmia also offers tech tools for creating video lessons and interactive homework
  assignments. They also offer training and information on using videos in the
  classroom and the flipped classroom model.
- I really like how easy it is to navigate through videos and find ones that best fit the
  subject and topic level that I am looking for.
- http://www.knowmia.com

Happy Monday everyone!

1 Year Blogiversary Winner!

     In January I celebrated my 1 Year Blogiversary by hosting a Mystery Prize Package giveaway in which I promised to create a customized prize based on the winner's interests. Maria from First Grade Carousel was the lucky winner and after some correspondence I went to work on creating her prize package!

     It took some time to get everything together as I commute to university (which is 2 hours away) and our local post office does not always have international shipping options (benefit of a VERY small town). After some time and commitment, however, the prize package arrived safe and sound in Pennsylvania! Here is what it contained:

- Bottle of Coca Cola (Maria's favourite drink)
- 2 Mesh Desk Organizers (what teacher doesn't need these!)
- Canadian Hockey Puck (a souvenir from Canada)
- 3 Packets of Various Post-Its: Bright Colour & Animal Theme
  (for organizational use & to match her classroom theme)
- 4 Animal Print Pens (to match her classroom theme)
- 2 Packets of Ladybug Push Pins (to match her classroom theme)
- 2 Retractable Dry-Erase Markers (great for teachers with students who
   are always on the white board!)
- 1 Scented Canadian Marker (another souvenir for fun)
- Decorative Coffee Cup & $10 Starbucks Gift Card
- Gum (to freshen breath after all the coffee!)
- Smarties & Mars Bar (Maria likes chocolate)

All organized and ready to pack up!

     Maria also wrote a wonderful post if you would like to read about what it was like to open the prize package from her point of view! Thank you again to everyone who entered and supported me through my 1 Year Blogiversary celebration and congrats again Maria :)

ManACE TIN & BYTE

On our way to Neepawa!

      I shared on Thursday that I would be presenting four presentations within 20 hours and I am happy to report that everything went smoothly! On Thursday evening I attended a Technology Information Night (TIN) hosted by the Manitoba Association for Computing Educators (ManACE) and presented a short 20 minute presentation with Tyler, a fellow education student, on our experiences with blogging. On Friday I attended the 2013 BYTE Conference and, with Tyler, presented two regularly-slotted sessions as well as a short 20 minute live-stream presentation as part of the Bits of BYTE setup. This was my very first time attending either of these events not to mention presenting at them so it was a very exciting and busy two days! I was also able to meet some of the people whom I have been connecting with via Twitter and it was so exciting! I am happy to say that everyone is just as wonderful in real life as they are online and I am proud to have such amazing educators within my network. It was especially awesome to finally be able to meet up with Mary and Georgette after connecting for so long online!! :)

     The sessions at both of these events cover everything ed tech related including tutorials on specific tech tools, trouble shooting tips, professional learning networks, specific learning activities hosted online and much more. In fact, there were over 80 sessions in total to choose from! If you'd like to see some of the awesome sessions that were offered, the schedule is available on the Byte 2013 Wiki.

ManACE Technology Information Night (TIN)

Tyler and I During Our Presentation

This was the first TIN presentation held in Neepawa and the first one that I ever attended! The atmosphere of these events are very casual and it is more like a gathering of colleagues as opposed to a formal event. Everyone in attendance is interested in learning more from the select speakers as well as providing their own tips and suggestions on the subject. As a group we started the event with supper before moving onto the presentations.

The first was a conversation facilitated by Andy McKiel titled "Killer Apps" where he shared some of his favourite iPad apps and then passed the floor onto other people to share their favourites. I shared the Remind 101 app that I used when I was student teaching which allows teachers to easily communicate with their students safely via text messaging reminders. My fiance, who is also an education student, downloaded one of the other suggestions; MyScript Calculator. It is a calculator app that allows the user to use their own handwriting as opposed to finding the correct buttons and typing in equations. It is really neat, easy to use and he loves it so far. There are also some cool sharing features as well as a feature that allows students to move step by step through equations to see how they are solved.

The second was a conversation facilitated by Janis Williams and Sherry Hannah about using QR Codes in the classroom. I was especially excited about this one because I have played around with QR Codes a bit but mainly for the purpose of attempting to go paperless and I was interested in seeing other uses for them. Janis and Sherry had a lot of examples placed around the room that we could scan and see what came up. Some of the ideas I especially liked were:
- Have audio clips embedded in a QR Code and attached to student work that is displayed on bulletin boards. By scanning the code, the audience can hear the student explaining their project, what they learned, what they liked about it, how they completed it, etc.
- Have bibliographies embedded in a QR Code and attached to student work that is displayed. That way the finished project like a poster, display, etc is displayed and the bibliography information is available but it is not taking up bulletin board room.

Tyler and I were the last presentation of the evening. Since we have both been blogging for over a year, we decided to share a Top 10 list of what we enjoy most about blogging and how it has helped us prepare for the education field. Here is a copy of our presentation:

BYTE Conference
Keynote Session
- Clarence Fisher

     When I first started getting information on the keynote session I was so excited to see that the keynote speaker was Clarence Fisher, who Skyped into our Internet for Educators class just two weeks ago! After hearing Clarence's thoughts in our classroom I was excited to see what his viewpoint would be for the session and I was not disappointed.

A panoramic view of the ~400 some attendees during Clarence's keynote address

Clarence really pushed for us to think about "big ideas" as we attended our sessions. While many of the sessions discuss various tech tools he wanted us to think beyond the tool itself and think about how we can use it with our students. What are we doing with technology that we wouldn't be able to do without it? He used his recent laptop purchase as an example when he stated that he would not be using these new tools as, "fancy typewriters". As we made our way through the day, Clarence encouraged us to Think Differently (how are we using technology) and Think Bigger (how can technology change our view of what learning is).

     Another exciting thing about the keynote session was that the evening before, while at ManACE TIN, Tyler was asked if he would create a "visual representation" of Clarence's talk while it was happening. Tyler is a very visual/creative person and often doodles his notes rather than using text (see an example here) and many people thought this would be an interesting addition to the presentation. So, as Clarence spoke, Tyler sketched out the aspects of his talk. Here are some pictures!

Tyler working on his sketch (left) and Clarence on stage presenting (right)

A panoramic view from Tyler's point of view at the front of the gym

Tyler and Clarence with the finished product

Global Education - Flatten Your Classroom
- Eva Brown, Kate Hallett, and Jennifer Kasprick

     I was originally drawn to this session because I have teachables in the Social Studies area (History, Geography, Geology), I live in a very small rural community, and I thought the information would help extend learning beyond the confines of the classroom walls. The beginning of the session was a brief overview about the importance of being a connected educator and a review of tools such as Twitter, Pinterest, Diigo, etc. Kate made an excellent point when she stated, "If we, as teachers, aren't connected we won't be able to connect our students." The remainder of the session was an introduction to the Flat Classroom Project and their experience with participating in some of the activities. Prior to this session I was unaware of the Flat Classroom Project and didn't know anything about it. Here is an explanation taken from their About page:
     The Flat Classroom® Projectis a global collaborative project that joins 
     together middle and senior high   school students. This project is part of 
     the emerging tend in internationally-aware schools to embrace a holistic 
     and constructivist educational approach to work collaboratively with others
     around the world in order to create students who are competitive and 
     globally-minded.
There are many different projects that teachers and students can take part in, depending on age level, subject area, time commitment, etc. There is a fee involved as well as very committed participation so I am unsure if I would be comfortable jumping into this type of project right away. I would love, however, to use these type of projects as inspiration and maybe create a similar type of project on a smaller level (with another classroom or close school). Participating in the full project is definitely something I would consider once I have been in the classroom for a year or two and am sure that I would be able to manage the time commitment appropriately. Here is a video put out by the project that explains some of the benefits of students connecting and collaborating on a global level:

Connecting, Reflecting, Creating: Why We Blog
- Kirsten Landen & Tyler Letkeman

Tyler and I at our session!

     Tyler and I presented during the second and third sessions that ran right before and after lunch. Our first session had a larger attendance than the second but both went very smoothly! I found some of the conversations during our first session interesting because not one person had any experience with blogging and only one was using social media tools like Twitter (which we talk about in our session too). During our second session we had participants that were actively blogging and participants who had previously blogged in the past. Some of the comments that arose during our sessions were:

- What is the benefit of putting information like this online?
   Both Tyler and I shared our personal experiences with how blogging has
   helped us develop professionally, make meaningful connections with other
   educators, archive our learning/ideas/thoughts, create relevant learning
   opportunities for our students and provide us with an authentic audience for
   our writing We also had some conversations about how it all depended on
   what kind of information people were interested in sharing (reflections,
   resources, classroom activities), why they were writing (to gain
   feedback, personal records, sharing with parents), and how they would use
   their blog (personal use, sharing with students/parents/admin, interactive
   learning, etc).
- Could this be done with students too?
   Of course! Tyler and I both agreed that we would be using blogs with our
   students when we have our own classrooms one day. We shared some of the
   great educators in Manitoba who are blogging with their students like Erin 
   Malkoske, Georgette Nairn, and Mary Bertram (who were all at BYTE)! We
   also talked about some of the tools like KidBlog and Quad Blog that can be
   used specifically with students for a safe and manageable environment.

Overall I feel like our sessions went over very well and the feedback that we have received so far has been positive. I'm not sure if we specifically convinced anyone to start blogging right away, but I feel like we provided a good framework so that educators are more aware of the benefits that blogging can bring. It definitely was a lot of fun to share our ideas and I am so thankful for the opportunity to present at such an amazing conference, thanks BYTE Committee!

Bits of BYTE - Celebrating Our Blogiversary
- Kirsten Landen & Tyler Letkeman

     During the fourth session Tyler and I also presented in the Bits of BYTE sessions that were streamed live online. These sessions were approximately twenty minutes as opposed to a full hour session so we both decided to present our sessions from the ManACE TIN event rather than try to cut down the information in our other session. Unfortunately, this meant that I couldn't fully attend the final session of the day so I missed out on a PLN session by Phil Taylor, sorry! This was a really cool experience and I was a bit star stuck to see all of the amazing educators who were also part of this event!

In addition to streaming live, the sessions were also archived so they can be viewed later on. I was excited about this since I will have a record of one of my first presentations! Here is our session :)

Video streaming by Ustream

_________________________________________________________

Overall I had a BLAST at my first ever ManACE TIN and BYTE Conference. I am so thankful for the opportunity to present my ideas along with so many great educators from across the province! I had an amazing experience and met so many awesome people!

I'm sending out a BIG thanks to all of the presenters, organizers, and volunteers for this event, you all did an amazing job :)

Congrats to Tyler who won the Snowball Microphone that he wanted SOOOOOO much!

Four Presentations in Twenty Hours

     Today is the start of a busy two days for myself and Tyler L, a fellow student teacher. In November I shared that we would be presenting our professional development session, Connecting, Reflecting & Creating: Why We Blog, at the 2013 BYTE Professional Development Conference in Neepawa. A short three months later and the day is finally here! One thing has changed, however, our one presentation has turned into four!

     Tonight Tyler and I will be presenting at the ManACE Technology Information Night (TIN) on Celebrating our Blogiversary. We will be presenting a twenty minute presentation on the top 10 reasons why we enjoy blogging and how it has prepared us as we develop as educators. I am pretty excited that Tyler and I were asked to be one of the three presentations at this event and it should be a great way to kick off the BYTE conference!

     Tomorrow Tyler and I will be presenting two slots of our session on Connecting, Reflecting & Creating: Why We Blog: 
     "From being used as a reflective tool and a means to gain meaningful feedback 
      from peers, to creating primary resources that can be used in the classroom 
      and building a valuable PLN, this session will demonstrate the benefits of 
      blogging as an educator. This session will provide an overview of the many 
      ways that blogging can positively impact your teaching through first hand 
      accounts, examples and hands-on activities. You are encouraged to bring 
      laptops/devices but they not essential."
We've already had an opportunity to present this session to our peers and one of our professors at our university so I feel pretty prepared for it. The main change, however, is that at the university we had a two hour slot and at BYTE we only have one so we need to condense our information a bit! 

     Our last presentation is part of the Bits of BYTE online streaming sessions organized by Andy McKiel. Here is an explanation of the sessions from the BYTE 2013 E-Program:

Image Credit: BYTE 2013 E-Program, page 5. Available online at http://byte2013.wikispaces.com/file/view/BYTE2013.pdf/408348754/BYTE2013.pdf

For this session Tyler and I will be doing a repeat of our session that we are doing tonight for the ManACE TIN event. Both of these presentations are the same time limit so it seemed natural to keep them the same instead of trying to condense our other presentation even further.

     Overall I am really excited about these opportunities and am really looking forward to networking with all the amazing educators that will be in attendance. I've been talking to many educators via Twitter over the last year and some of them will be at this event so it will be interesting to meet up in "real life". After so long it will be nice to meet the "familiar strangers" of Twitter, as Darren Kuropatwa would say.

Twitter... 1 Year Later

     Shortly after beginning this blog in January of 2012 I decided to join Twitter as well. Looking back at it, I can't remember if there was something specific that attracted me to Twitter but I do remember that I was pretty overwhelmed at the start. The first few days I used it I pretty much had no idea what I was doing and didn't understand how to use it effectively. Slowly I began to get used to the format and am now completely addicted! Twitter is now my go-to PLN tool and I've been able to network with some amazing educators from all over the world.

     I am now following 766 accounts that vary from other education students, educators, educational resources, education companies, and anything related to material I am using in the classroom. I would never be able to keep up with everything, however, if it wasn't for the "Lists" option. Some of the accounts I follow like the Winnipeg Free Press tweet ALL DAY LONG and completely clog up my news feed to the point where I could never find anything useful. To help, I've made specific lists that narrow down the accounts that I follow so it is easier to find information that I am interested in. For example, I can click on my "BU Education" list and easily see all the tweets from other education students without the clutter of the other accounts I follow. I also subscribe to other people's lists so that I can find other accounts that interest me. For example, I can click on the "Manitoba Educators" list by the Manitoba Teachers' Society to see tweets from other educators in Manitoba. In the image below, the first five lists are ones I have created myself and the remaining are lists that I subscribe to.

     If you are interested in learning more about Twitter and it's benefits for educators I definitely recommend checking out Twitter for Educators: A Beginners Guide which covers everything you need to know in plain English. It includes the benefits for educators, how to get set up, following people, getting people to follow you, Twitter "lingo" and various other applications that can help you get set up. Even after using Twitter for a year I've found this guide useful, especially the section on Guidelines & Best Practices.

Image Credit: Twitter for Educators: A Beginner's Guide Cover, http://images.pcmac.org/Uploads/MCPSS/MobileCounty/Departments/Forms/Twitter%20for%20Educators.pdf

Do you use Twitter?

What is your favourite thing about it?

Resources To Start Off Your Week 54

     Happy Louis Riel Day! In Manitoba we are celebrating a long weekend and I am really enjoying the extra time to work on homework and spend time with family. Coincidentally it is also storming a lot so I'm think that I would be at home even if it wasn't a holiday! This past week has been a busy one for resources as I summarized over twenty resources for my post on Infographics and Videos in the Classroom. As I do with all of these resources, I will be adding them to my lists of resources under the Fav Websites heading.

1 ) Flashback Firsts - 125th Anniversary of National Geographic
- To celebrate their 125th Anniversary, National Geographic has put out
   several new features on their online database; one of which is the Flashback
   Firsts gallery. This interactive image gallery features images from events
   that were the first of their kind like the 1909 Arctic Expedition, Manchu Pichu,
   and more.
- There is an information icon in the bottom right hand side that can be clicked
   on for more information on each of the images.
- This gallery could provide some interesting pictures that can be used in activating
   strategies or could be used as an example for students to create similar galleries
   about "firsts" in their lives!
- http://www.nationalgeographic.com/125/flashbacks-125th-anniversary/#/3

2 ) Middle School Chemisty
- This is a great resource for teachers who are teaching science! Here is the
  description from the site, "What happens when solids, liquids, and gases are
  heated and cooled? Why is one substance more or less dense than another?
  What causes certain substances to dissolved in water? What happens when a
  chemical reaction takes place? These questions and many more are explored
  in Middle School Chemistry, a resource of guided, inquiry-based lesson plans
  that covers basic chemistry concepts along with the process of scientific
  investigation."
- In addition to accessing all the lesson plans online, teachers can also download
  the entire 691 page Teacher's Guide book, access multimedia videos and
   demonstrations for each chapter, and get detailed materials lists for organizational
   planning.
- A BIG thanks to Mrs. Brown at The Science Life for letting me know about
  this great resource :)
- http://www.middleschoolchemistry.com/

Happy Louis Riel Day everyone!

My Digital Footprint

     We have discussed the idea of "digital footprints" in almost every single one of our education classes over the past two years. We have discussed them in regards to professionalism, liability, privacy, networking, et cetra and I think we have all come to realize just how important our online presence is. As teachers, it is very important for us to maintain a professional appearance in and out of the classroom. Our administrators, board members, parents and students can all be online looking for information about us and it is important that our online presence upholds the professional standards that is expected of a teacher.

#ISRU11 - We ALL leave a digital footprint by OllieBray. Flickr Image at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/olliebray/5542813754/

     As part of our Internet of Educators class, we are encouraged to explore our digital footprint and see what it might say about us. I headed over to Google and here is what I found:

"Kirsten Landen" resulted in 302 results!
Here are the results that are actually representing me:
1) Professional Portfolio of Kirsten Landen
    - The professional portfolio I created for interviewing and showcasing my work
2) Faculty of Ed at BU Ning Profile
    - The profile I created for the BU Ning site
3) EduCon Profile
    - The profile I created to register for EduCon, an online P.D conference
4) Beaches of Glacial Lake Agassiz
    - A project I created in my undergraduate degree for a Geomorphology class
5) Residence Assistants
    - My profile for my position as a Residence Assistant at BU
6) Vokle Profile
    - The profile I created to sign in to Vokle to screen the live sessions of EduCon
       last year
7) Support Blogging Wiki
    - A wiki showcasing various edubloggers
8) 2013 BYTE Conference
    - The session Tyler and I are presenting at the BYTE conference this year
9) ManACE TIN
   - The session Tyler and I are presenting at the February ManACE TIN event
10) The Freshman Olympics
       - An interview with the university paper about an event I organized while working in
         residence

     Most of the time when I am using online services I DO NOT use my real name. For example, my Twitter and Pinterest accounts are both under MissLwbt which is simply a shortened version of my blog title. This is more for the simplicity of having a cohesive online presence that is connected to my blog rather than privacy. My Facebook account is under a different name all together as I use it for personal interactions rather than educational networking. I am also getting married this June and plan on changing my name, so I will have to begin creating an entirely new digital footprint!

    I found that the various pages within my Professional Portfolio, my presentation on the Beaches of Glacial Lake Agassiz and my activity within the BU Ning seemed to show up the most in a Google search and made up the first 5-ish pages. A lot of Facebook pages and other pages in Swedish also showed up but those were about someone with the same name, not me. I would hope that since all of my relevant searches are related to my time at Brandon University or other related educational services that my digital footprint would be considered professional.

More Than Just Bill Nye... Using Video in the Classroom

Growing up my only real memory of watching videos in class included Bill Nye, the Magic School Bus and any movie-version of the novel we happened to be studying at the time. I don't remember video actually being used as a learning tool to expand student learning, it was almost always used after the learning and assessment had taken place.

Finished learning about the circulatory system? Here's a Magic School Bus video to watch. Finished learning about magnets? Here's a Bill Nye the Science Guy video to watch. Finished reading Shiloh? Here's the movie-version to watch.

In fact, I only remember watching videos in Science or English classes. The only times we ever watched videos in Social Studies, Math, or any of our elective courses it was an unrelated video that was watched during a "fun class" or when we had a substitute teacher.

     In today's classrooms, video can and should be used at any time during the lesson to assist in student understanding and present material in a way that you can't. The internet has opened up so many options for teachers that cost is no longer an issue. We don't need to worry about ordering in new video content or loaning out videos from other schools to use. A quick Google search can find thousands of videos out there that are created specifically for classroom use.

     In addition to using video to acquire new knowledge on a subject, I've also used video clips to jog students memory on a topic and activate their prior knowledge on a subject. For example, when we began discussing the War of 1812 I had my students complete a K.W.L chart on the subject (what they KNOW, what they WANT to know, and what they LEARNED). After letting them discuss and write down a few ideas, I showed these two videos:

After watching these two short clips students began talking about what they learned in previous classes and what they had heard in the media (since it was the 200th anniversary of the battle). I found that these videos helped students get excited about the topic because they knew a framework of what they would be learning and they especially wanted to make sure they could answer all the questions in the interview-style video.

     Here are some places where I go to find videos to use in the classroom:

____________________________________________________

Crash Course!
- If you haven't already subscribed to the Crash Course! YouTube Channel
  you should go do so right now! John and Hank Green have created short
  (14 minutes or less, approximately) videos to teach about World History
  (John's specialty) and Biology (Hank's specialty). So far there are 81 videos!
- These videos give a breakdown of all of the important information on a topic
  through easy-to-understand lecture, videos, images, maps, neat graphics, etc.
  I like the fact that these videos explain the how and why and not just "this is
  how it is" explanation that you often find on the internet.
- These videos are definitely something that I am going to use in my class as a
  review tool or even as an activating strategy! 
- http://www.youtube.com/user/crashcourse?feature=watch

HipHughes History 
- If you haven't already subscribed to the HipHughes YouTube Channel
  you should go do so right now! Keith Hughes, a YouTube Next EDU Guru,
  has created hundreds of videos (approximately 30 minutes or less) to 
  teach about World History, US History, Politics and more!
- Keith seems like an awesome teacher and his videos are very engaging!
  He uses a lot of different music, backgrounds and eye-catching intro clips
  to catch your attention quickly. I really like that Keith's explanations really
  seem like he is talking to a class, not a robotic scripted speech like some
  edu-videos I've watched.
- I like that he has created playlists so that videos are easily searchable by
  topic!
- http://www.youtube.com/user/hughesDV?feature=watch

VSauce YouTube Channel

- This YouTube Channel features some great videos that could be used as

   activating strategies in the classroom such as "Is the 5 Second Rule True?"

   and "What if Everyone Jumped At Once?". These videos are very

   engaging and I can see students getting really excited by the off-beat and

   interesting information.

- These types of videos could also be used as examples for teachers and

   students to create their own videos!

* Some videos on this channel would not be appropriate for the classroom

   so make sure you explore fully before you use it in the class

- http://www.youtube.com/user/Vsauce

Minute Physics

- This YouTube Channel features some amazing videos that would be perfect

   in a science class. The RSA Animate style of the videos is engaging and the

   information is summarized clearly and quickly!

- If I was teaching physics I would definitely show these videos in class or have

   the links available for students to checkout at home for homework help.

- I have absolutely no background in physics and I found these videos pretty

   helpful!

- http://www.youtube.com/user/minutephysics

I Witness: Holocaust Video Archives 
- I Witness is the perfect resource to bring history to life!
- This website is an archive of 1,000+ one-on-one interviews with
   Holocaust survivors and other witnesses.
- This website is specifically designed for educators, allowing users to
   not only watch videos but edit their own video projects, browse the
   encyclopedia and create secure accounts for students.
- http://iwitness.usc.edu/SFI/Default.aspx

TED-Ed
- From the amazingly wonderful TED non-profit group comes TED-Ed.
  Their compilation of educational videos are the perfect accompaniment
  to your classroom lessons.
- Not only does this website have some great videos, but they provide us
  with the resources to create a customized lesson around it!
- http://ed.ted.com/

MIT Video
- MIT Video hosts more than 100 channels that users can easily search and view!
  Scroll through their channel lists by subject area or for specific topics you may be
  studying in your class.
- Not only could you use these videos to supplement your lessons but students
   could also use these videos to research a specific topic.
- http://video.mit.edu

EduTube
- A "YouTube-style" website housing educational videos.
- Teachers and students can search and view videos on a variety of educational topics. 
- A big plus is that the videos can be downloaded and saved!
- http://www.edutube.org/

100 Best YouTube Videos for Teachers
- A comprehensive list of educational videos on YouTube.
- Includes videos on history, science, language, arts, inspiration, classroom
  management, how-to's, technology and more! 
- Provided by Classroom 2.0
- http://www.classroom20.com/profiles/blogs/649749:BlogPost:177332