Tooble Video Downloader

I'm indebted to Tom Barrett for making me aware of a fantastic little application called Tooble. Tooble may very wel be the ultimate YouTube video downloader.

Tooble runs on your computer and lets you search YouTube for keywords (or you can give it the direct URL to the video you want). All you need to do is check the box next to the videos you want to download, and Tooble gets to work downloading them onto your computer.

I gave it a test run with one of my favourite clips from Brainiac; the Walking on Custard clip. Tooble quickly downloaded it as an MPEG file with little fuss. By default it puts it into your Music folder and even imports it into your iTunes library but you can change these settings if you wish. You can change the file quality to best suit playing on an iPod too!

This could be the ultimate tool for any teacher who cannot get YouTube in their school because of filtering, or who wants to snag a clip to make sure they don't lose it if it's removed or net access is not working when they give their lesson.

Go download Tooble now!

You Tube Downloaders Again

Following on from a training day in Birmingham yesterday, I promised the delegates I'd try and produce a summary post on some of the various ways to download videos from You Tube to use offline.

I have written about this before, and a list of all the posts on this blog that mention video can be found here.

The method I tend to use the most is this script which basically gives you a piece of code which you drag to your toolbar in Firefox as a button. When you click the button it puts a "download as mp4" link on the YouTube page. Follow the instructions on the page. You will need to use the Firefox browser, which you can easily download for free here.

A different method is to use the ConvertTube website. You simply paste the URL (the web address) of the YouTube video you want to download, and it does the rest.

Similar sites are You Tube catcher, You Convert It and also Zamzar.com

There's also a site called Kiss You Tube. If you find a YouTube video you want to download, simply edit the www.youtube.com/blah blah address and stick a "kiss" before the youtube bit. ie www.kissyoutube.com/blah blah. The instructions are on the Kiss You Tube site. Just add a kiss ;)

Sites such as You Tube use flash video (flv) format. This can be played directly on the page in Smart Notebook, as far as I know not yet in Promethean. You can download third party players that will play these files. If you have the choice of video format it is probably worth using a different format such as mp4 which can probably be played on something you already have on your computer without having to download anything else. You can then hyperlink to these files from your whiteboard software - they will then open up and play.

If you want to know how to insert a flv file into Smart Notebook, Jim Hollis has produced a great little guide here.

I've made a list of sites tagged with YouTube on Delicious. Some of the sites are downloaders, others are useful sites that may be of interest.

On the subject of sites for video resources - don't forget to check out both Teachers TV and the BBC Learning Zone. Both of which have some very good teacher resources

How to embed a YouTube Video into PowerPoint

I had somebody show me this trick yesterday at a training session I ran.

I've played with the control toolbar in Excel and Word, but never had a reason to investigate it in PowerPoint.

This technique does rely on you having YouTube access at the time you do your presentation. It doesn't physically embed the YouTube video into the file, just makes it part of the presentation. I'd still suggest looking into YouTube downloaders to get the file if access to YouTube in school may be an issue.

How to Link a YouTube Video Into Power Point - Upload a Document to Scribd

As an aside, If your school uses Channel 4 Clipbank to host videos in-school, then you can use a similar technique to link to the videos. This guide shows you how to do that.

Periodic Table of Videos

A quick post to share another interesting site for Chemistry I picked up from a discussion on the TES forums.

The Periodic Table of Videos has been produced by Nottingham University Chemistry Department. There's a nice 3/4 minute video clip about each element. Some show reactions, others just talk about the elements.

From looking at some of the videos I would guess the most suitable age range for this would be A-level chemists, but some of the clips would be suitable for GCSE too. You may want to check them out before using with your class to see if their going to be suitable.

Other alternatives include Web Elements, and my particular favourite, Theodore Gray's wooden periodic table site, home of the (in)famous Sodium Party where he sourced 3lbs of sodium and proceeded to throw into large buckets of water. If you're ever showing the reaction of Sodium and Water and the students ask you to throw in a bigger bit - then these are the videos to show them!

Another favourite is the Brainiac Alkali Metals video, that apparently has now been debunked as slightly fake. A shame as its very funny. But I'll copy it here anyway because it always raises a chuckle on training sessions.

YAYTD

or.. Yet Another You Tube Downloader

ConvertTube is yet another website that will let you download YouTube videos and save them as different file formats to use offline. Again, handy for teachers that can't get YouTube at school.

http://www.converttube.com/

Thanks to Lisa Thumann for the link.

Download YouTube Video

I've given a few links before to sites that allow you to download YouTube videos.

Well now I have another one to add to the list. This Script can be added to the toolbar of the Firefox web browser. When you see a video you want to save, click the button and then the page changes to allow you to save the file as an .mp4 video file.

All the instructions are on the page and it seems relatively straightforward. The thing to remember is to change the filename from .htm to .mp4 when you save it.

Obviously it goes without saying that you need to be aware that you may be infringing copyright by storing these clips - but this does provide a good workaround for those teachers who want to show a YouTube clip in a lesson where the school have blocked YouTube access.

Whiteboard training day - links

A big thanks to those who came to London today for the Lighthouse IWB training day. It was good to meet you all. I hope some of you are now checking out this blog.

I'll put in this post some of the links that cropped up on the day.

How to save YouTube videos
A good guide on how to do it from Teachers Love Smartboards
Video Downloader for FireFox
ZamZar.com

Saving Flash Animations
SWF catcher for Firefox
Flash Saver for Firefox
Flash Saver for Internet Explorer

Smartboard Training Materials
Printable Materials and Two Minute Tutorials here.

Promethean Training Materials
Training Manuals from Promethean
Top tips on using Promethean boards

Getting Smart Notebook 9.7
Smart Download Page

Getting ActivStudio 3
Guide on how to get it

Health and Safety Guidance
Links to Becta and HSE

IWB Links
My del.icio.us links for whiteboards

Thanks again for attending the day. And please get in touch if you have any other questions about your boards that you think of in the weeks to come.