United+Streaming

===Teachers will explore DiscoveryEducation to learn to use the streaming/download videos, lesson planner, and all of the available options in DE. Teachers will sign up to become Discovery STAR Educators as part of this process.  ===

Date each entry and put the newest entry at the top of the list.
2/9/09 Explored United Streaming for video clips pertaining to our subjects. Looked at various ways to use United Streaming including the "idea of the week," from the United Streaming website. Reviewed how to logon and create assignments to publish for your classes.

10/20/08 Facilitator: Josh Thomas

The group focused on how we have used United Streaming in our classrooms in the last couple weeks. Josh has used United Streaming frequently when teaching about the civil war and Jeanette has used it frequently to teach parts of speech (because they can be boring without visuals!).

Carol Stem found great writing prompts for children of all pages on United Streaming. The prompts are also accompanied by a pictured to help students with creative writing. The prompts can be used for expository, persuasive, informative, or narrative writing.

Josh taught the group how to create an assignment for their students in which they can log onto Unitedstreaming.com and sign in to view a specific video that was assigned by the teacher.

How to create an assignment for your students:

Log on to unitedstreaming.com and sign in under educator. Click on "assignment building" on the right of the page.(Make sure you are in DE streaming) Under "create an assignment" click "create new" Give the assignment name (be as specific as possible and possibly give it a number) Click on where you would like to save the assignment. Recommended to save under "my content". Tell what subject the assignment is and what grade level you teach. You can click the option that allows you to receive an email when a student completes an assignment. Under "search for media" type in a keyword to find a video on the topic you want to assign.

Mare Mawser
===**Overview of Discovery Education (aka United Streaming): ** Discovery Education is a video database where educators can find videos that are relevant to the curriculum they are teaching. By placing videos in the "My Content" folder, educators can save and organize the videos they consider beneficial to their teaching. They are then able to use the selected videos for future lessons. The videos become easy to access and make Discovery Education a resourceful way to integrate technology into their classrooms.=== 

Discussion topics:

 * Josh showed all members present how to create a log in name to start a discovery education account. If you do not have a previous account you can create one by putting in the school's eight digit passcode: **CB13-D6CC. ** Create a user name and password and fill in all required information to create an account. Josh then showed the members how to search for videos by **grade and topic **.
 * He also showed us how to save videos in the "My Content" folder to make the videos easy to access in future lessons. You can also rename a folder to be better organized. Example: You can put all videos on verbs, adjectives, nouns, commas in a folder named "Grammar." That way, when you are ready to teach that topic, you can access that folder with ease and know its content without having to root through hundreds of videos.
 * The group discussed the proper equipment needed to use Discovery Education in the classroom. You need an LCD projector, a computer, speakers, and an adapter for the computer. Every team should have an LCD projector, some teachers may need to ask to borrow it from a team partner.
 * Members were allowed time to explore and Josh helped all members troubleshoot. Josh also showed the group how to find supplemental resources (quizzes, teacher's guide) to use to gauge comprehension of the material shown. The supplemental resources are listed under "**RELATED MATERIALS."**


 * Plans for future meetings: **
 * Members plan to discuss the videos they were able to view and find, which they believe to be beneficial and relevant to Unionville-Chadds Ford's curriculum.
 * Discuss student access to Discovery Education
 * Discuss how to create a place for all teachers of the same subject to share and use videos via the database.
 * Discuss how teachers can create lesson plans using D.E.