VOST2011: The Visions of Students Today

What do students in Higher Education see today? What do they “see” in the sense of, “What are their visions?” And, what do they literally see from the place in which they are expected to learn?

This is the question posed by Michael Wesch, professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University. Wesch is well known for his work so far in gathering and analyzing the experiences and voices of higher-ed students in an internet age.

Watch some of the YouTube videos tagged VOST2011. For an educator in Higher Ed, the videos are rather hypnotic, occasionally disturbing, and often illuminating. Take the following as an example:



More upbeat, but not less analytical or thought-provoking, is this piece from a student at University of the Philippines:



In the professorial circles in which I run, I am probably among those more likely to identify with the students of VOST2011: besides being a “distance pedagogies guy” (in progress), I am after all a Gen-Xer, and until a subject matter grabbed me in my Masters work, felt continually disenchanted with and alienated from the structures of education, while still identifying strongly with other students as a peer group. At the same time, however, I am formed by an exceptionally traditional and modernist Ph.D. program, and believe as strongly in “disseminating data” as in facilitating constructivist activities for peer-to-peer learning.

Professors: What do you think of Wesch’s call for submissions, and what do you think of some of the videos? How do they speak, or not speak, to you as educators?

Students: What are your visions today? What do you see from the place where you are expected to learn?

[VOST2011: The Visions of Students Today was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/03/25. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Closed Captioning for User-Generated Video (via ProfHacker)

[Changed title, but not URL, to reflect distinction between subtitles and closed-captioning.]

Yesterday, ProfHacker posted a blog entry about how to produce closed-captioning for your videos using the site Universal Subtitles. As ProfHacker points out, when you have created the subtitles, they exist only at the Universal Subtitles web site; but, you can download the subtitles as a file and upload that file to your video on YouTube. ProfHacker shows the process, step by step.

Embedded below is my first effort at closed captioning. The main glitch is that my videos often already have subtitles of varying kinds, because they are often language-learning videos. And, you cannot (I think) change where the closed-captioning sits: it is always at the bottom of the screen. Now, if your already-existing subtitles are YouTube “annotations,” you can always go into YouTube and move them around. But, if your subtitles were created with the video itself (as in iMovie or whatever), then you would have to actually go back and re-edit the video and upload the revised version (which would have a new URL on YouTube).

The take-away on this for me is that, when I produce subtitles in my videos (that is, subtitles that are not closed-captioning), I will want to keep them at the top or sides of the screen, so that there is room reserved at the bottom for closed-captioning. As you can imagine, the screen “real estate” will really be filling in at that point.

This is my video on how to sing Happy Birthday in Hebrew. In the few places where my subtitles and my closed-captioning collide, I have not tried to fix it (yet). Obviously, you will need to click the "cc" (closed captioning) button at the bottom of the video screen.



What experience do you have with closed captioning, whether needing it or producing it? What issues should I know about as I continue to closed-caption my videos?

[Subtitles for User-Generated Video was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/03/11. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Fourth Aleph-Bet Learning Video

Okay, the fourth video is up. It includes the letters דּ/ד, ט, תּ/ת, and also summarizes the “weak dagesh.”

This one had room for many more of the “Some Hebrew words” at the end. I also began ordering the words from short to long.

The next one, besides adding the sibilant consonants, will also introduce the “strong dagesh.”



[Fourth Aleph-Bet Learning Video was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/01/25. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Third Aleph-Bet Learning Video (גּ/ג, כּ, כ, ק)

The third video in my Hebrew Aleph-Bet series is up. This series teaches the Aleph-Bet by leading the learner through active use, beginning immediately by pronouncing open syllables with all of the biblical Hebrew inventory of vowels (and composite shewas). Consonants are not learned in order, but according to their place of articulation:

• א, ה, ח, ע (“pronounced in the throat,” i.e., glottals and pharyngeals);


• בּ, ב, ו, מ, פּ, פ (“pronounced at the lips,” i.e., labials and modern waw);


• גּ/ג, כּ, כ, ק (“pronounced at back of hard palate,” i.e., velar and not-careful-uvular);


• דּ/ד, ט, תּ/ת (“pronounced behind upper teeth,” i.e., dentals except sibilants and sonorant/liquids); also weak dagesh;


• ז, ס, צ, שׂ, שׁ (“sibilants”); also strong dagesh;


• י, ל, נ, ר (“sonorant grab-bag,” i.e., all that remains); also simple shewa;


• use of ה, ו, י as matres lectionis.

Each video concludes with a series of biblical Hebrew words, using only the consonants learned to that point.

Thank you for checking them out, and let me know what suggestions you have for improvement.

[Edit: Here are videos one and two]



[Third Aleph-Bet Learning Video (גּ/ג, כּ, כ, ק) was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/01/20. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Second Aleph-Bet Learning Video

I have made available the second video in my series on learning the Aleph-Bet through active use. The first video covered א, ה, ח, ע, and all of the vowels. This second video covers בּ, ב, ו, מ, פּ, פ.

I plan to edit them at least once when they are all finished, so please offer any feedback that you think would be helpful. להתראות!



[Second Aleph-Bet Learning Video was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/01/19. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Aleph Bet Learning Video

Next year, I will be teaching Hebrew using an almost completely immersive approach. Preparing for that, I have begun recording and editing a series called, “A Foundation for Biblical Hebrew.” This series will include:

• A handful of short videos introducing the Aleph-Bet through usage;


• Eight or nine short videos each introducing words that can be used in daily life (greetings and pleasantries; coping phrases; classroom words; useful adjectives; adverbs of time; body parts; numerals; colors; seasons and weather);


• About 350 slides showing photographs or clip art of biblical Hebrew words (nouns, adjectives, verbs) that are very common in the Bible, or that are very useful for daily modern conversation.

Production values will be, er, moderate, but the videos will be freely available on my YouTube channel (“AnummaBrooke”), and the slides—in whatever format I decide to produce them—will be “open access.”

If you are able to take ten minutes to view my efforts, thank you, and I welcome feedback!



[Aleph Bet Learning Video was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2011/01/17. Except as noted, it is © 2011 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Kids Discover: Mesopotamia

My son subscribes to Kids Discover periodical. The current issue is titled, “Mesopotamia,” and is simply excellent.^[FOOTNOTE]

Each two-page spread of “Mesopotamia” is on a single topic, e.g. “Sumerians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and More”; “Day to Day”; “Gods and Demons”; “Those Accomplished Mesopotamians”; “The Legendary Gilgamesh and the Origins of Writing”; “How We Know What We Know.”

If that list of topics does not have you slavering for a copy, well…what am I saying? Of course it does.

Each spread comprises a short summary followed by 12–20 photographs and drawings, captioned appropriately for elementary-school-aged kids. I recognize many of my favorite images among these, and also a great many surprises. Speaking of surprises, I am almost embarrassed to say how much I am learning from this juvenile resource (Assyrians crafted a ground-glass lens?).

If you are still on the fence concerning whether to chase down a copy…



I want to say just one word to you. Just one word. Are you listening?

“Expisticy.” [Dang: “extispicy”; we used to joke about “extra spicy”; thanks, Chris.]

Back issues of Kids Discover can be ordered for $3.99 through their home page. “Mesopotamia” is Volume 20, Issue 5, May 2010. You can just enter “Mesopotamia” as a Quick Search term on their Store page.

BACK TO POST (Kids Discover is a periodical “curriculum supplement,” and contains no advertising. See their home page or Facebook page for information on Kids Discover. I do not work for Kids Discover and they do not pay me to say nice things about them.)

[Kids Discover: Mesopotamia was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/05/06. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

Passover on YouTube

Overwhelmed this week? Yes, thanks for asking. In the meantime, enjoy a collection of YouTube videos relating to Passover, courtesy of JR.

Dressing Like A Professor

A good friend of mine tells me about a seminar in which an uncomfortable, even heated, exchange arose over “dressing like a professor.”

For my part, I used to dress informally when teaching. In short order, I realized that:

• I look younger than many of my students;


• I am younger than many of my students;


• Many of my students don’t respect the au-tho-ri-tah of some kid in jeans. Even in jeans and a sweater. Even in sunglasses.

So, pretty early on, I learned that I have to “suit up.”



Except for my tennies. And except for examination days, when according to custom so long-standing as to amount to superstition on my part, I make a point of dressing down.

Besides, in the immortal words of Joey “the lips” Fagan, “All the Motown brothers wore suits. You play better in your suit.”

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_tOW2TWmtY"] (update: now blocked by user)

Of course—the devil is always in the details—there are still the finer points, especially for women (after all, why should this be an area where professional women don’t live in a perpetual double-bind)? Must a prof be dowdy? Is it possible to be too hip? Or even too (gasp) “feminine” (that is, shaped vaguely like a human female)?

So, for your part: what does it mean for you to “dress like a professor”? To what extent may a professor “embrace her/his inner fashionista (or fashionisto)”?

[Dressing Like A Professor was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2010/03/03. Except as noted, it is © 2010 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]

All the Great Old Testament Stories in Ten Minutes?

How much would you love to see it done, as a video response to All the Great Operas in Ten Minutes?



I really love Kim Thompson’s video: it’s casual, it moves rapidly, it sparks a desire to see the full-length operas, and it challenges the misconception that opera is dull. I love the chiming bell after each segment when the selling points for a given opera are shown: prostitution! brawls! stabbing of animals!

If it were me, I would choose well-known Hebrew Bible narratives, but take the opportunity to show that they are not what you think. For example, that in the “walls of Jericho” story, the Canaanites do not have a misplaced faith in their mighty wall: they all know that they’re dead meat, having utter faith in the ability of the God of Israel to bulldoze their city. Or how patient, silent Job spends hundreds of words describing God as an amoral monster. Or how Eve never tricks Adam into eating anything.

Can you imagine getting Job down to one minute or less? And imagine the paper cutouts!

Another approach would be to narrow the scope in some way: All the Great Women of the Hebrew Bible in Ten Minutes, perhaps. Or, the Deuteronomistic History in Ten Minutes.

I can easily imagine a homework or extra credit assignment here. What would you do—or ask your students to do—with All the Great Old Testament Stories in Ten Minutes?

“Hebrew is a Hard Language” (YouTube)

Watching the whole video (it’s only 77 seconds), and reading the comments, will help to clarify what’s happening:



What makes it funny? What parts of the dialogue can you figure out?

Modern Hebrew Vocabulary Videos

Jacob Richman offers a series of YouTube videos that teach modern (Israeli) Hebrew vocabulary. He organizes the videos by topic: for example, there is one on fun and entertainment, another on clothing and accessories, and so on.

Jacob’s YouTube channel includes other language vocab videos as well, including Spanish and English. As with any YouTube user channel, you can enter a search term in Jacob’s video box to narrow the selection: when I enter the term, “Hebrew,” I get a page with only the Hebrew videos (more or less).

The videos show still pictures and pointed (vocalized) Hebrew script, along with general-use transliteration and English translation, with the Hebrew word being read aloud. The format is clear and consistent. The videos focus only on vocabulary: they do not teach phrases, syntax, or plural forms.

You can find an index of the Hebrew videos on Jacob’s web site. The web site also includes other approaches to the vocabulary.