Video Distribution Systems
When I hear someone mention video distribution system or closed circuit television in our school, I think about morning announcements or special events where teachers may tune their televisions to an auxiliary channel to view a special episode of Charlie Brown or the Polar Express. (I have little experience with closed circuit television.) McGraw-Hill Science and Technology Encyclopedia defines closed circuit television as the following:
Television transmitted to a particular audience at specific locations via coaxial cables, telephone wires, fiber-optic strands, microwave radio systems, or communications satellites, as compared to open-circuit (broadcast) television intended for the general public.
At Whitesville Road Elementary, we use a video distribution system on a daily basis to hear our morning announcements. We say the Pledge of Allegiance, hear a weather report and lunch menu for the day. Sometimes we might see a special guest, a short skit, or a classroom performance. Occasionally, a program is broadcasted for a grade level on our video distribution system. In this case, a teacher fills out the Video Request Form stating the name of the program and it’s correlation to the curriculum. The form is sent to an administrator to be reviewed and signed. Currently, our system will broadcast VHS, DVD and cable programs and is operated entirely by our media specialist.
Georgia Public Broadcasting (GPB) Resources
GPB Education is a site that offers locally produced media content for Georgia classrooms. What makes this site so attractive is that everything found on the site is already correlated to the Georgia Performance Standards and best of all….it is FREE! It contains a plethora of resources aimed at teachers, parents and students. It even offers training and professional development using PBS Teacher Line.
There are a series of tabs located across the top of the screen. Information and links are organized under these tabs. For example, you may browse under the “Learn” tab to find resources sorted by age category, or specifically for parents or teachers. However, you might find the same links on the “Programs” tab or the “Science Central” tab under other categories. There seems to be a lot of overlap, however, there is so much information to be found including podcasts, videos, online games, online publications and lesson plans. At the bottom of the page are links to PBS sites, which in turn have many resources including full-length videos, online games and archived webinars.
On the home page of GPB Education, you will find the login screen for Digital Education. If you are not familiar with GPB Digital Education and its partnership with Discovery Education, you might remember it as United Streaming. To access GPB Digital Education, you must have a user account. If you don’t already have an account, you should first obtain your school’s unique passcode in order to set up your personal account.
Once you are logged into Discovery Education, searching for a subject is easy. You simply key in a topic. You have the option of performing an advanced search by selecting a range of grades or a media type, or you can search by a specific curriculum standard. Once you obtain results, you may continue to narrow your results with other selections on the left side column.
Our media specialist, Calvin Bryan, stated that at our school, Discovery Education is typically used on an individual basis in classrooms. My personal experience is limited to quick searches for videos on special student interest topics. Earlier this year, we discovered and captured a mantis insect on our playground. I quickly searched and found a short clip on the life cycle and habits of a mantis so we could determine if it would be a suitable (temporary) class pet. After learning about its diet of live insects, we opted to set the mantis free.
After my research on GPB Education, I now realize we have a library at our fingertips. We have access to quality educational media resources that are already correlated with standards and it are free to those who search.
Christy,
ReplyDeleteAT my school, we use the closed-circuit tv for scrolling announcements, displaying special tv channels as well as our video production class. It has it's own channel.
We have a variety of tvs spread around campus--some in gathering places, the cafeteria, and in classroms too. Most of these locations show the scrolling announcements as well as recent episodes of the school news.
United Streaming and Safari Montage offer a wide variety of videos for teachers to bring in to their classroom and they are usually very educationally sound and trusted.
Thank you for sharing:)
It really is amazing how everyone can watch one program at the same time, if needed!
I, too, have not had much experience with closed circuit tv. And I’ve been to schools where it is used a great deal, and other schools where it is hardly used at all. At one elementary school, the media specialist had to set a timer to remember to play specific videos at specific times for different classes. She could have up to three videos running at once! The problem with closed circuit is that while they all have the same basic features, not one model is the same as the other. Some have one remote that controls all four vcrs. And sometimes the vcrs don’t all work. So it can get really complicated when you have to troubleshoot. I hope the one in the school system I go to has a user manual! Otherwise it’s going to be a lot of trial and error!
ReplyDeleteI’ve heard of the GPB resources, and I’ve used a couple of their interactive websites such as the WWII interactive oral history project. The website features different interviews with veterans and discusses various topics such as concentration camps, postraumatic stress, and what “war” actually means for those experiencing it. At my school, we also use United Streaming quite frequently. And I agree with your media specialist that it is mostly on an individual basis in the classroom. I work with students with physical and intellectual disabilities, and (while it may seem cliché), they really enjoy watching episodes of Sid the Science Kid and The Magic School Bus. There are also multiple videos designed for young children which discuss math concepts, grammar, and other simple educational activities. My only complaint is that there aren’t more social studies activities geared towards younger children. There are some great videos, but they're dense and can (at times) be hard to follow for our kids.
The schools I have worked at also do the announcements over a video distribution system and show holiday related movies. The school I work at also does a “Book of the Month” that the whole school explores. Occasionally, the media specialist will tie in a resource that was found with this book. For example, last year we read Molly Bannakey, and the media specialist found a reading of the book that was projected in small pieces for the school. It was a great way to tie in the book. When we want to watch movies in the classroom they can be checked out from the media center and played on VCR/DVD combos in our rooms, of if a grade level wants to view the same video, it can be set up from the media center. I enjoy using United Streaming in the classroom. It has great content! I haven’t had as much experience with the GPB site, but I will definitely look more into it. Since it is a Georgia based programmer then I would hope that it would have some great videos that tie into the Georgia Standards.
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