Value of Video

Another of the outstanding applications which made the American Association of School Librarians 25 Best Websites for Teaching and Learning in June of 2012 is Vialogues.  Vialogues falls under Media Sharing, Standards for the 21st-Century Learner, 3.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to organize and display knowledge and understanding in ways that others can view, use and assess. and 3.3.4 Create products that apply to authentic, real-world context.  The use of Vialogues is, at this time, free.

As stated in the About page on their website:

Vialogues gives you the opportunity to participate in a focused environment that allows you to absorb the content of a video while commenting on it.

At the home page users can search for previously created Vialogues using keywords in a search box or Explore by viewing:  the most recently created Vialogues, a listing from A-Z, those with the most recent comments or the most active Vialogues.

In order to create a Vialogue you must Sign up by entering in your first and last name, a username, an email address and password.  Please read the Terms of Service (which does not make mention of an age limitation but be sure to observe the under 13 year old requirement of getting parental/guardian permission prior to use). As soon as that registration is completed you are asked to log in.

In the upper right hand corner of the tool bar is the means of accessing your profile, your groups and account settings.  To the left of that is a star icon where favorites can be filed.  To begin simply click the Create button.

Step one is to upload a new video, one on site or from YouTube.  I used a YouTube video by copying and pasting the unique URL taken from the share section beneath the video. To get it to upload to the Vialogues site I clicked on the large blue box to the right of the upload box.

Video formats accepted by the site are: .mov, .flv, .mp4, .mpeg and .avi.  Up to 1GB is supported.

Step two asks you to title your Vialogue (under 30 characters) and give a description of what you desire from your participants (in 500 characters or less).  When completed click the Create Vialogue button.  The next screen is an overview of the Vialogue you have generated.

The default setting for your Vialogue is public allowing for anyone to make comments.  It can be changed to selective in which participants names are entered in the dialogue box with a secure URL link provided which can be copied or emailed.  Underneath the video and description you provided is a space for requests, a list of polls you created and under advanced the ability to delete comments and the Vialogue.

If you wish to add questions to go along with the video move your mouse to the video until your mouse turns into a hand (indicting a hyperlink) and click.  At the next screen under the video on the right is a Q/A in green speech bubbles.  Click on those.

A small screen slides out to the right allowing you to write multiple choice questions for a single correct response or an all-that-apply response. As many as 26 responses can be written by you.  Select the plus sign to enter in a possible answer, select the minus sign to delete an answer.  When you are satisfied with the question and responses click the post button.  Even after a question and answers have been posted, they can still be edited or deleted; mouse over and the icons for same will appear.

To comment type it in under the video and click post.  In small print at the bottom of the comment area,  you can toggle back to the manage page, embed this Vialogue in a blog or website using HTML code or post it to Twitter.

At the bottom of any screen is a complete help section; from time to time a red feedback & support tab will pop up in the work area in the lower left.  This application is extremely uncomplicated to use.  I highly recommend the use of Vialogues in the educational setting.

I can see students watching videos and designing desired dialogues for other classes; using research skills to write descriptions as well as the questions and answers.  This would be a great venue to use when critiquing book trailers; what makes some better than others?  Author or illustrator interviews could be watched, followed by a written discussion.

Below is my simple Vialogue.