In the past year or so, I’ve noticed how much my husband and I have been plugged into the Internet and our laptops. We are constantly writing/reading emails, reading the news, and planning our school lessons. However, we’re also watching a lot of videos online–from the news, television shows and movies to the entertaining YouTube videos.
Sometimes I find myself irritated when my husband is tuned into his laptop while watching TV and trying to grade, but I think this multi-tasking is an ever-growing trend in our world today, especially with the teenagers I serve. My students often tell me they spend their nights doing homework, IMing, reading MySpace/Facebook blogs, watching TV, and listening to music–all at the same time. I’m not sure how they can accomplish all of those tasks at once (I’m more of 2–maybe 3–item multi-tasker.), but they do.
Recently, I was reading a post on Stephen’s Lighthouse where he references 2 YPulse articles about college students and videos. The statistics are fascinating but not surprising.
College Students Love their Video (YPulse)
College Students Watch The Most Video @ Mom & Dad’s
Of course, these statistics point to the ever-growing recognition that we, as librarians, need to reach our patrons in multiple ways, but one of the fastest growing methods may be through online videos. As a future school library media specialist, one way I could reach more students is by creating video booktalks and/or short informational (yet humorous–always keep ‘em laughing) lessons about researching/library resources and later uploading them to YouTube and the school website. As an avid reader and teacher, I would love to find videos of book descriptions and reviews that would be entertaining yet informative. However, I think students–especially those who are not avid readers or users of the library–would especially like these videos because they could fast forward through topics they are not interested in, create tags and comments, or even better, make their own video posts/booktalks/responses. Students love watching their peers in videos. Asking students to create a short video about a book, a library resource, or an information/research skill might increase student participation in the library since they could engage in authentic creation. But more importantly, creating videos & YouTube posts would help the library be seen as more than just a card catalog or print warehouse.
Florida’s AskALibrarian has already involved students in video production, and they are getting a little press about their efforts. Check out the finalists’ videos. They are funny.
I totally agree about the potential use of online videos. In my Literacy and Library Involvement class (also saw it on the ALA Direct email) we watched an intro to the library video by Harper College (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHljR4LYmOA). It is a great example of using humor to introduce library services. I like the idea of creating videos to promote the library and its services. I remember watching a video in 701 that Michael and his former library had created and put to music for their staff in service day. I had been really impressed that the video used every staff member. I could imagine it being viewed for the first time and all the staff watching to see themselves having fun at their job. By involving students and the wider community in the process of making such promotional videos each of them may feel their bond to the library strengthened by their active participation. In short, I agree that online videos can have a positive affect on the library.
This is a great example of a blog post: links to articles from another blog, your critical thinking and relevance to our field. Well done.
Creating and using online videos for a school library media center is a great idea. It’s a smart way to get the students actively involved and yes, they’d love watching their peers and themselves! It would definitely make the library seem more in tune with student interests and how they get their information. The Florida Ask-a-Librarian videos were a hoot–I particularly liked the one by the homeschooled student. Thanks for the links and for such an insightful post.—Martha