You tube-cit-2010-v2-web

Using YouTube to Develop & Assess Pre-service Teachers’ Expertise in Instruction & to Help Develop Peer Networks – within an Online Course

Empire State CollegeMaster of Arts in Teaching Program Eileen O’Connor, Ph.D.

Agenda

Background on the course & the needs of the course ; research questions

Findings from the YouTube pilot Conclusions, improvements, and

next steps – within teacher education

Some general findings for all instructors

Course Particulars

Pre-service teachers who are learning to become science teachers; career changing adults

An associated course is face-to-face and allows these teachers to practice but content-pedagogy experts are not always

available Purpose of YouTube pilot—to have students:

develop a microteaching that they share with peers & the instructor that can aid in their development as K12 teachers, that can serve as a course assessment , and that can encourage peer networks

Course particulars: the nature of the course interactions

The online course itself is highly interactive and tech-enabled online course: Second Life for meetings and discussions Talk-aloud discussion boards for planning Networking students in an expressed

instructional objective

Demographics: Career-changing adults

Content area:

Physics Earth Science

Chemistry

4 2 4

Gender: Female Male5 5

Approx. age:

Under 30 30 – 45 45+

3 3 4

Research questions

Can the use of readily-available video-recording and sharing applications, such as YouTube, provide more opportunities for pre-service teachers working in a largely online environment to practice teaching before they enter the classroom? How can having more opportunities for content-expert faculty review help these students grow as research-based science teachers? Can students in online courses develop more collegial relationships through YouTube sharing?

What areas appear as problematic when students self-created and posted these videos – from a technical perspective and from a presentation perspective?

How did the YouTube serve as an assessment tool within the course? How has the use of student-developed videos improved the course effectiveness?

What can be gathered from this study that could inform online courses in general? How self-videotaping and posting be used to improve future courses with pre-service teachers?

You & your online students get to know

each other

Findings: students get to know each other

More personal interactions were apparent: Peer help with creating and posting the

YouTubes Students discuss their presentation style▪ Do I look shifty eyes?

Students comment about themselves personally▪ Not happy with the beard it was shaved

Personalities become apparent From show-off-y to competent to quiet

Findings: learning the technology

Some technology struggles in the beginning; but quickly overcome – issues at the beginning: Uploading problems – timing out / too long Embedding the right links No Helpdesk – students helped each other Initial handout from the instructor with some

“basics” The icebreaker to test the process was very

helpful - and students enjoyed their presentations

Ways students worked

1st microteaching 2nd microteaching

Used attached webcam 2 of 10 students 2 of 10 (same students)

Used detached video camera 8 of 10 students 8 of 10 (same students)

Created some video-editing 3 of 10 students 4 of 10 (one new)

Sophisticated video-editing was clearly stated as NOT being required; this was not per se a technology course

View students’ actual work

Findings: now you can analyze performance characteristics

1st YouTube 2nd YouTube

Addressing a K12 audience 3 of 10 (30%) 8 of 9 (89%)

Challenging K12 student with questions

3 of 10 (30%) / 3 partially (30%)

2 of 9 (22%) /3 (33%) partially

Asking K12 students to make predictions

3 of 10 (30%) 0 / less relevant

Most of lesson tells K12 students what to observe

7 of 10 (70%) 6 of 9 (67%)

Such as the style of teaching that was evident:

Students were creative in displaying data & its use

A “performance based” assessment

Brings in a vital aspect of instruction and review: The process of creating the microteaching is

instructive in-and-of itself▪ As evident in the scientific quality within the productions

even without specific coaching on how & what to present Kindly but pointed review▪ Mastery of many areas but still not student centered or

interesting▪ More similar to actual classroom observations

The content-pedagogy instructor can now observe technique, technology integration, & aspects of comfort in front of an audience ▪ Difficult qualities to assess in online environment

Findings

Good science & tech . . . however: Too much to an adult audience – their

colleagues▪ Despite criteria, notes, rubrics, and

comments▪ But improvement by the second

microteaching Too much “this is what you show know

about science” and not enough engendering of the questions that science addresses

Too little evidence of why K12 students would be interested or engaged in the science

Benefits

Good way for online instructors to get to know students – in an asynchronous manner

Easy to use: The learning curve for the technology is small Network students for peer support

Important communication skills that teachers need: Good modeling for their own classroom; K12

students work well in this environment

Value to the students

Practice with the technology and with the teaching; learning how to assemble materials needed, how to address the standards

Getting to know their peers better Using 21st century skills

Value in teacher prep

Practicing with assembly of all the materials and ideas needed when teaching: Requires the integration of many areas: the

science; the lessons; the technology; and the videotaping goes beyond what is evident in a lesson plan

Provides practice in speaking and later critiquing ▪ The natural concern about speaking with colleagues as

evident in comments to the audience and introductions Also, these students may soon have to do a

demo lesson on a job interview

Value to using YouTube, in general

•Accessible to most students

•Useful especially with online; improves student & teacher communication

Easily implemented

•Many facets can be studied

•Richer assessments possible since live materials can be readily reviewed

“Performance” can now be observed

•New questions arise about what is evidence of learning in the content area

New ways of teaching &

learning emerge

Lessons learned for teacher ed: more research & development needed

Very valuable techniques – show the good and the bad of teaching As we were taught – but movement towards best practice VERY difficult to change practice – we teach how we were taught

Requirements for improvement – in the outcomes and the instruction (the technology itself was mostly supportive) A more realistic conception of pre-classroom teaching needs and

how they are assessed must be developed More YouTube models of best practice – they should be analyzed

and discussed by students before they create their microteachings; more scaffolding and assignments on the student-centeredness aspects

Criteria & rubrics should better alignment with desired outcomes within the video format – need to highlight the new expectations

Address ways to bring in the unseen audience Consider creating more specific peer review – anonymous, perhaps

Pilot outcome

Very worthy – providing a whole new face for pre-service teacher education Closer to the classroom – than written lesson plans;

much better assessment of preparation for teaching However, lack of “real” students may have skewed

this towards a performance for other scientist Performance-based assessment – heralds our adult

students: good concrete experience Need to bring the course itself into better

alignment with this performance approach areas in need of improvement were highlighted

Notes to prospective implementers

Valuable way to assess performance but we need to improve the evaluation of live performances and not simply “papers”

Particularly useful in clinical programs and/or where performances are required

Model the techniques you want Easier said then done In teacher education, you need a new mental model

of teaching; the YouTube gives evidence to the deeper thinking of students

The instructor will have students continue to use these videos in the fall semester’s course