Thing 9

I like that YouTube is a great place to find fun videos. I have mainly used it in the past to find fun videos (mostly ones that students suggest). And some of these videos have even been related to biology :)

I dislike that there is no "filter" on YouTube. I guess there are some restrictions on what can be posted, but I wish there were more restrictions. I also dislike the fact that I could spend so much time watching some of these videos! Some of them are so funny, and then you can click on the related ones on the side, and watch more, and it goes on and on...

I have found videos on YouTube in the past that have been helpful for teaching. But what I really liked is asking students to post on YouTube. Some students in my physiology class last year made an extra credit video and posted it on YouTube as a way to turn it in. It was great! I did need to have a talk with them about not using their real names and such... But that is the video that I went back and commented on.

YouTube is not restricted in my building; however, we are given some strict guidlines for using it. Not so much guidelines for content (which is just expected), but guidelines about streaming and using bandwidth. There have been times when some classes in the building were searching for videos on YouTube while I was trying to stream a video from another site to show in one of my classes. The YouTube searching took up too much of the bandwidth and caused major problems with my video. This issue with bandwidth is one that my school is constantly struggling with. Hopefully, we can resolve some of the issues in the near future...