How Does Watching/Listening Faster Affect My Learning?

OK, having read my previous posting, Learn Faster by Watching Faster, and asked "How does faster watching/listening affect learning?" How can my brain comprehend content that is faster than the typical human speaking pace?  

Good Question.  The answer is - It all Depends!  Some research supports accelerated watching/listening.  Some research found that students do poorly on tests after watching/listening to videos 2x times the regular speed. The problem with these studies is that they approach it as an either/or situation.  They have students listen to content at 2x and then test them.  

Success with this process is a personal outcome. It depends upon:

• Content of the video/audio. 
• Your ability to understand the audio language. 
• How much attention you are paying to the audio track. 

People typically speak English at about 150 words per minute (wpm).  (I would assume that this applies to other languages as well, but I didn't find any research on that.) Our maximum rate for comprehension is about 450 wpm.  This means that we might be able to triple (3x) the speed of discourse and still understand it. 

What Will Work for You?

I must admit that I usually keep my listening at a 1.5x or 1.75x rate. I have tried 2x but don't find that comfortable. Your choice must be based upon what works for you . . . but what is that magic speed?

The Oxford Online English center suggests a short test to identify which speed works best for you. 
Oxford Online English - How to Understand Fast Speech.

Begin by finding an audio track (maybe on a video) containing the type of information you typically need to learn.  Wouldn't make sense to listen to a highly-technical medical video if you will be listening to lectures for typical education videos.  It will work best if you have a transcript of the piece, but not necessary.

1. Warm up by listening to a few sentences in the video.  Try to remember what they said.
2. Listen to another sentence.
3. Try to type/write out the sentence exactly.
4. Repeat this for 2 more sentences. 
5. Compare what you typed/wrote to the transcript (or listen to it again.)
6. How many mistakes did you make?  Every missing, wrong, or forgotten word is a mistake. 
7. You are only allowed 1 mistake.  Any more, then you need to slow down your speed and try again.
8. If you got them all right, try it again at a faster speed. Continue until you find the speed you want to use.

What worked for you?  I had a couple of errors at 1.75x - but I plan to get better.

Pay Attention!

The most important part of understanding rapid speech is to PAY ATTENTION!  It's too easy for us to try to multitask while watching a video.  The problem is that we often don't remember what we just heard because our minds had drifted to something else. That means that we have to listen to watch/listen to it again. 

You have to pay careful attention if you are speeding up your videos. If you speed up a 12-minute video to 1.5x, you will be able to watch it in 2/3 of the time, or 8 minutes.  If you try to multitask while listening, you may have to watch it again and extend it to 24 minutes - it's YOUR CHOICE.

Watching/Listening Faster

Watching faster can mean a big difference in how much you can learn in a short period.  This can be a great boon to your students' learning as well. Chances are that many of them are doing this already, but they may think it is cheating.  Let them in on this secret.  Try doing it in class so they can see how it works. 

Introduce your students (and yourself) to another way in which you can understand the world.

Have you been speeding up your watching/listening?  Leave a comment about what you have accomplished.

Z

BTW, Speeding up podcasts to make listening more efficient is called PodFasting.  It's a great way to catch up on the podcasts that you missed. Check it out.

Inouye, M. (2016) Can We Speed Listen and Still Understand?

iGoogle Disappears November 1, 2013

On June 8, Google announced that it would discontinue iGoogle on November 1, 2013.

The official explanation for this change in marketing strategy is "with modern apps that run on platforms like Chrome and Android, the need for iGoogle has eroded over time."

What this really means is that Google has decided that they cannot successfully market ads to a personalized environment like iGoogle.

What will be in its place? Google probably envisions Google+ working as a handy substitute. It doesn't have the features of iGoogle, but this means that Google will be updating Google+ to try to accommodate the present needs for an RSS resource center.

Many users who use iGoogle as their start page, may replace their control dashboard with NetVibes or ProtoPage or My Yahoo. Lifehacker provides a good comparison of NetVibes and ProtoPage in a recent posting. They are both great alternatives for iGoogle.

If you are interested in making Google+ your homepage, I believe this would be in the form of a Business Page.  There are already tutorials about making Google+ Business Pages like this one from Social Media Examiner. It could be pretty cool to have your Google Hangout on your opening page. You could talk with your friends at the beginning of your day and never get any work done.  =-)

NOTE: Discontinuing iGoogle is part of a "spring cleaning" that Google appears to be doing to streamline their offerings.

• Google Video stopped accepting submissions in 2009 and will be moving its content to YouTube soon. if you have videos on Google Video you have until August 20 to migrate, delete or download your content.
• Google Mini, a customizable search engine, will discontinue at the end of July.
• Google Talk Chatback has been discontinued. 

What will you do? Do you use iGoogle to organize your PLN or with your students' PLNs? How will this affect how you organize your life?

Z

Related articles

• Google to Shut Down iGoogle

  ---

• Say Goodbye iGoogle and Hello to Symbaloo

  ---

• iGoogle Refugees Flood Netvibes

  ---

Dr. Z's Creative Cookbook for Collaborative Communication - Part Deux

Once again we are at ISTE '12.

What a wonderful opportunity to meet old friends, learn new things, and walk in the sun.

Here is a link to my Slideshow for my Cookbook presentation.  Unfortunately it is just a .pdf for now, but I will post the real posting later.

• Twitter search for #Drzreflects (As time progresses, these tweets may disappear.)
• Collaborative Google notes that were created by one of the attendees.  These were open for everyone to contribute during the presentation but have been locked to keep the content valid.

VoiceThread:

• Letters from the Internment Camps - 5th graders interview survivors of internment camps.
• 21st Century Learning - Example of including video lecture, documents and videos in a VoiceThread.

• WikiBook on TPACK - WikiBook created by UNI Masters students in Spring, 2012.
• QR Codes video - Useful introductory video by Common Craft.

Share Your Screen

• Join.Me - Share your screen with up to 250 people simultaneously.
• Google Hangout - Watch a short introductory video about using Hangout with fellow students.

Audio Annotation

• AudioBoo - Create an audio response to your students' work.  Just send them the URL to the audio file. Includes a mobile app. These files are not private. 
• Chirbit -  Another tool for creating an audio response to your students' work.  Just send them the URL to the audio file. Includes a mobile app. These files CAN be made private.

Screen Casting

• Jing - Free brother-version of Camtasia by TechSmith. I have used this as my default screencaster for years.  Limit of 5 minutes. You download the program to your computer.
• Screencast-o-Matic - Just discovered this option this summer. This system will allow you to record up to 15 minutes. You can save your files in .mp4, .avi, and .wmv formats.  It is all online.

Video Annotating and Editing

• VideoANT - Provide written notations for a video as it progresses. The viewer progresses through a collection of notes as the video plays.
• WeVideo - Full video editing capability online. 

I hope that these resources are useful for you.  If you have any additional resources that you would like to share, add them to the comments section.

Z

Related articles

• Screencasting

  ---

• 5 Easy Tips to Create Video Screencasts Like a Pro

  ---

• Top 5 Tools for Impressive (and Easy) Vlogging

  ---

VideoAnt Enables You to Annotate Videos

VideoANT from the University of Minnesota is an online tool that allows you to annotate videos. This system allows you to identify significant parts in the video and then make synchronized annotations.

It's not complicated but it can be quite useful.

Imagine that you have a video that you would like to have your students watch on their own, but you would like to include your own notes as they progress through the video.  This will enable you to do that.

Imagine that one of your students have just made a recording of a lesson that they taught in their student teaching.  She has posted it in her digital portfolio and then shared the link with you.  You have the opportunity to provide time-line based feedback.

VideoAnt is limited to working with files that are online. The only way that you can specify a video is to provide the URL for it. These videos must be .mov, .flv and YouTube files.  

How to Use VideoAnt

The actual process of using VideoAnt is quite well document through the University of Minnesota website.  They have a website which provides steps for the overall process.  



Examples:

• Using VideoAnt Annotations to Provide "Audience-Based" Assessment to Students' Video Productions by Richard Beach
  
• COL Corner

How do you think that you could use VideoAnt in your daily activities?  Could you use this with your students?







There is also a video tutorial

100 Best YouTube Videos for Teachers

WOW!!!!

Just when you thought it couldn't get any better, John Costilla shares a list of the Top 100 Videos for Teachers provided by SmartTeaching.org.

This list of videos have been divided into 9 different categories including history, arts, science, language, classroom management, How-Tos and a variety of others.


I can take a tour of the Rijksmuseum or learn sign language or get tips on classroom management.  It even includes The History of the World and The Theory of Everything. The selection is quite varied.

I must admit that some of the videos were inaccessible because they had been removed from YouTube. Some of the links weren't touch and go. I had to copy the link to paste it into a new browser window.  Anyway, it is a useful set of resources that you will enjoy.

. . . and now for something completely different!!!

I used this video by Steve Vai as an example video from YouTube when I was teaching my students how to embed a video into their blog. I fully intended to remove this video at a later time because it didn't really have much to do with educational technology.

After watching the video I realized what an awesome guitarist Vai is and how well he has orchestrated his group to support him. I decided that it has everything to do with educational technology so decided to leave it in.

Besides, this is MY blog and I, Dr. Z, am Reflecting!!!!!

Must See YouTube Videos

What YouTube Videos do you identify as your MUST SEE videos?

I was just reviewing Steve Dembo's posting about Mandatory YouTube Videos and it got me thinking about which ones I think people should watch.

Steve lists a few videos that I knew and liked including:

• Wesch's A Vision of Students Today and Web 2.0 . . . The Machine is Us/ing Us.
• The latest edition of Did You Know 3.0 by Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod.
• The updated Did You Know 2010
• The Introducing Le Book depicting a support person for using books.

I was intrigued by the first two videos including:

• Digital Dossier which describes the digital trail that we leave from birth
• Food Fight which is an incredible example of stop action video creation. It is literally a war between foods. I would suggest previewing this before sharing with students due to the graphic depiction of food annihilation.
  

I would like to add a few of my personal favorites:

• Bob Sprankle's I Had a Dream where he asks "If we didn't have today's schools, would we build today's schools?"
• Don McMillan's Life After Death by PowerPoint where he shows you how NOT to use PowerPoint.
  

There are many more videos that should be listed here. What would YOU include in your list? Give us the link as well as the title.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Did You Know 4.0: The Media Landscape (viralblog.com)
• 6 Fan-Made Music Videos That Are Better Than The Official Videos (manolith.com)
• Teaching in the Interactive Classroom (slideshare.net)

Downloading YouTube Videos with a PaWN

You WON'T believe this!!!!

Think of the times when you wanted to download a YouTube video and it didn't work. Maybe the website you were using timed out. Or maybe the link in the email never arrived. Whatever it was, it was frustrating!!

Never fear! PWN is here!!!

Thanks to DetURL!, you won't have to worry about these issues again. I don't know how it works but DetURL! has developed a hack so that all you have to do is insert the letters "pwn" into a YouTube URL and you will be able to download your favorite YouTube in MP4 and Flash Video formats

Here's the link to a favorite video of mine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uyr8W2zwAo

Want to make that video your own? All you have to do is insert the letters, pwn, before youtube.com and after the www. and the magic will happen.

http://www.pwnyoutube.com/watch?v=2uyr8W2zwAo

The screen will change (See image on the right) and you will have your choice of formats.

Of course, you might want to keep using Converttube or Zamzar but this King of a new trick will keep you from getting Rooked when you are trying to download a video some dark Knight.

What do YOU use?

Z

Tools for Video Authoring

Ever create a video and upload it to YouTube? Everybody's doing it. Although the statistics haven't been openly available since Google acquired YouTube for $1.650,000,000 (in Google stock), Comscore estimated that in January 2008 alone, nearly 79 million users had made over 3 billion video views.

Here is a video by Jon4Lakers about how to make a video using Macintosh iMovie HD and upload it to YouTube. It is not too complicated. You will note that he did this video while on a studybreak from "writing essays for business school" (note that it has been viewed almost 11,000 times - not bad for a studybreak.)

Jon4Lakers was also courteous enough to provide some instruction on how to use Photobooth on his Macintosh to create YouTube videos.

Wondering how to do this with Windows Movie Maker? It is a little more complicated, but JohnGregory08 from Australia provides a 10-minute video about using MovieMaker to create a video.

Want to know how to do specific things in Movie Maker?
Atomic Learning has a set of 63 free videos for Windows Movie Maker 2.

Screencasting
Wondering how to share what's happening on your screen? This is called a screencast. There are a number of programs that you might want to use: Snapz Pro X (Mac) or Camtasia (Windows)

Another option for screencasting is Jing. This is a free, on-line version of Camtasia by the same company, TechSmith. Dr. Z has already posted on Jing in an earlier blog posting. It is a powerful tool that will allow you to create an online video up to 5-minutes in length. Read his posting to learn more about it.

Here is a video that demonstrates and explains Jing.

The world is full of examples of educators using videos to involve k-18 learners in expressing and exploring new ideas. Here are a few examples. Those of you in the EIT class should have received invitations for becoming authors in this blog so add your own examples (followed by your name). If you aren't from this class but have ideas, add your suggestions as comments:

• A Vision of Students Today (Dr. Michael Wesch - Kansas State University)
• A Vision of K-12 Students Today (bjnesbitt)
• . . . your ideas? . . .

Photos: www.flickr.com/Aster-oid, jon4lakers. atomiclearning.com, jingproject.com

What Makes a Good PowerPoint?

I have spent years teaching students how to make good PowerPoint presentation. It seems to be working because their PPTs are getting better each year.

The interesting thing is that the most effective way to teach success with PowerPoint is not to show them examples of good ones. It is to show them how bad PowerPoints can be.

I just found a YouTube video of what appears to be a comedy routine done by Don McMillan. I don't use the word "appears" because it isn't funny. I use it because it looks and sounds like it is filmed in a comedy club. Don does a good job of showing REALLY BAD PPTs.

Everything is R/evolution

I have been fascinated by Dr. Mike Wesch's video reports on his exploration of mediated culture. He has created and posted 3 videos that have documented his travels into this topic.

Web 2.0 . . . The Machine is Us/ing Us

A Vision of Students Today

Information R/evolution (Just posted in October)

While these are the primary videos that people discuss when they discuss Dr. Wesch's work, there are a few others that I have found on YouTube.

Introducing Our YouTube Ethnography Project - Just an intro to the students who are doing the ethnography project. Not too insightful.

WorldSim Preview for Spring 2007 - This is a VERY moving video about using simulations in the classroom to learn about worldwide interaction. It interlaces videos from the world news with video of what appears to be a culmination of a simulation in one of Dr. Wesch's classes. Being a professor who is always trying to find new ways to get students thinking in my classes, I really liked this video.

I greatly admire Dr. Wesch and the involved atmosphere that he is creating for his students and himself. Perhaps the best part is how this is being documented. You have to wonder about the process that he used to achieve these final products.

You can learn more about this and his mediated cultures work at Kansas State University at http://mediatedcultures.net/

Using YouTube to Teach

Well, I just created my first tutorial video for YouTube. Actually, I created it for my Emerging Instructional Technologies course at the University of Northern Iowa, but I am storing it on YouTube. I tried to upload it to TeacherTube, but it took forever to upload it and I finally quit it and went for YouTube.

The tutorial instructs my students how to add blogs to their Google Reader utility. It is quite informal. I did the personal introductory part in my livingroom and then did the screencast (video capture of what was happening on the screen) just using my computer and computer microphone.

This video, Adding Blogs to Your Google Reader is accessible on YouTube for you to watch and then try out.

STUDENTS: I would suggest that you:
1) Watch the video to see how to do it.
2) Try adding this blog, Dr. Z Reflects, to your Google Reader.
3) Go to our wiki page where students are posting their blog addresses
4) Add your classmates' blogs to your Reader and keep up on what they are saying throughout the semester. You might even want to react to their comments to build a REAL learning community.

This may be the beginning of something big.

Z