Tools for Schools: Streaming Helps Teachers Reach More Students

Partisan proponents of streaming media tend to exaggerate its potential, attributing to it Superman-style powers. It's faster than a speeding bullet, capable of leaping tall buildings, and destined do nothing less than save the world. It usually takes just one foray into streaming media to discover that, for all of its promise, it’s no cure-all.

But when it comes to the superhuman task of revolutionizing public education, the power of streaming media is already proving to be more than just hype. Take for example, Los Angeles' Olive Vista Middle School, where streamed video clips are successfully and cost-effectively stimulating young minds.

"To see the look on a child's face when they connect with a concept and share in their joy when they truly understand the subject matter is a wonderfully gratifying experience for all our teachers," says the school's principal Jean Whitaker.

And what is the secret weapon her teachers are using to deliver these "A-ha" moments to her students? It's the power of video, says Robert Lewis Benavidez, the school's technology coordinator. Some kids respond to visual information better than to verbal information, he says. Add to that a language barrier—in the heavily Latino district, English is often a second language—and video becomes even more appealing as a way to augment traditional teaching approaches.

Olive Vista Middle School is one of more 26,000 schools across the U.S. that has chosen to receive streamed video instructional content over the Internet from unitedstreaming , a K-12 educational video-on-demand service from Discovery Education (the academic wing of the Discovery Channel). Discovery recently acquired the service when it purchased veteran educational video provider United Learning.

Olive Vista has just finished testing the unitedstreaming service as part of an independent study to try to measure the effectiveness of the company's video-based instruction. Approximately 2,500 sixth and eighth graders at the school participated in the study. Each student was given a pretest to assess comprehension of specific California state education standards for math, and at the end of the quarter, post-test assessments were given to gauge improvement. Throughout the quarter, teachers assigned to experimental-group classes incorporated approximately 20 standards-based, core-concept video clips into their daily lessons, while teachers in control-group classrooms continued with their traditional lessons. The results showed a statistically significant improvement of 3-5 percent greater information retention for the experimental group students versus those not exposed to unitedstreaming video content.

While 3-5 percent may not sound like a huge improvement, Benavidez points out that the study period covered just three months. He believes the percentage would rise if measured over an entire year. Anyway, Benavidez doesn't need numbers to prove to him what he's seen first hand. "The the student’s reaction is, 'Hey, that's what you [the teacher] meant. Now I get it,'" says Benavidez. "These students have grown up with TV, and they really relate to this medium." One student even thanked him for the videos, saying "I was tired of hearing the teacher talk."