Grassroots Video

My Space or yours?
Until very recently, getting video onto the Internet involved quite a bit of know-how. Now it just takes a phone and You Tube. According to the Horizon Report 2008, grassroots video is one of the six emergent technologies that are set to transform teaching, learning and creative expression, with a ‘time-to-adoption’ horizon of one year or less. It is redefining notions of what is a useful bit of video: ‘more and more, it is a two to three minute piece designed for viewing in a three inch browser window or on a mobile phone’.[1] Is this the future of learning objects? Why don’t we make more use of the vast array of learning objects out there on YouTube? What will this mean for traditional teaching methods? Is the lecture dead?

There is some evidence that far from killing off the lecture, You Tube and My Space TV can be used to repackage the lecture. Recording lectures offers students the chance to reprise their learning. Far from giving students an excuse not to attend the lecture, there is anecdotal evidence that recording the lecture and making it available on YouTube lets students see what they are missing. It is also a great marketing technique, reaching out beyond the university to the whole world. Big higher education institutions like University of California Berkeley, USA, and The University of New South Wales, Australia, have invested heavily in getting branded space on YouTube. They are not only aiming at students who can’t attend lectures but secondary-school students as well. Check out UNSW Lectures Go Live. And because grassroots video is disruptive technology, with low barriers to entry, there is nothing to stop individual tutors taking their course materials online.

[1] The New Media Consortium, Educause Learning initiative, The Horizon Report 2008 Edition, (2008)
http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2008-Horizon-Report.pdf Accessed 29 July 2008