Creating Videos for the Classroom

For portfolio piece #6, my group members and I had to create a video for classroom instruction.  We decided to create a video on Tourism for a Grade Five Social Studies class.  The video was entitled "Tourism in Antigua and Barbuda" and showcased many of our cultural heritage, historical sites and natural features.  Tourism is the main industry in this twin island state, hence, we chose this topic to sensitize our students about what tourism is and the many benefits it provides to our country and workers.  This video serves as a visual representation of the tourism product in Antigua and Barbuda and will allow the students to get a feeling and taste of what their country has to offer to the world at large.  Creating this video serves as a classroom tool where students are able to view different tourism products without having to leave the classroom.  They will be enthused about what is being displayed and will want to participate in classroom activities.

This video could be used to improve classroom instruction because it will help to capture the attention of the learners thus increasing their motivation and enhancing their learning experiences.  This video will aide in the development of a common base of knowledge about tourism among these grade five students.  It will also provide greater accommodation for the different learning styles that is, visual and auditory learners.  By using videos to teach or enhance a lesson, students will learn about the topic being presented to them without getting bored easily.  Also, I believe that by using videos to assist in teaching a topic could improve any lesson because it helps to communicate non-verbally with the students.  This video on tourism will be used to assist the teacher when teaching the topic of tourism to children.  This will help to appeal to their emotions and dramatize various events and concepts that are happening due to tourism.  Not only will such a video teach important concepts but it will also provide conditions where cognitive learning takes place.

There were a few challenges encountered by my group members and myself while creating this video.  The first major problem was that we had a hard time finding an appropriate song for the students.  We could not choose any type of music to do this video because we were dealing with children, hence we had to find an age appropriate song.  After a few attempts, we were able to come up with Tizzy's song "Expose" as this was quite fitting for the video and was age appropriate for the students.  The other challenge faced was that we were unable to get the music to play at first.  When we uploaded the song to the video, it did not play because there was a problem with the software.  We had to download the software once again and re-add the music to the video.  After several tries, we became successful.  I believe that this piece could have been improved in a few areas.  First, I believe that when we were creating the audio, the music could have been lowered so that we could hear clearly what the narrator was saying.  Another way the video could be improved is that when it reached a certain part, the music stopped abruptly.  I believe that my group members and I could have worked some more to improve this error, so that the video could have flowed smoothly. 

Below is the video that was created by my group members and me about tourism in Antigua and Barbuda.  I hope you will enjoy!!!