Poynter colleague Al Tompkins wrote an item in Morning Meeting about this cool new Google tool that lets you type in any topic and see video clips of the politicians talking about it. Type in “education” and you see excerpts of candidates’ ads that mention education and entire speeches that include the word. The embedded player even shows you where in the clip to look and shows an excerpt from the text, so you see the context.
Seems like a great resource for students writing papers on the campaign for a social studies class or preparing arguments for a speech or debate.
And it got me thinking. School media strive for relevance. What if you regularly recommended Websites that could help with schoolwork? Ask teachers for suggestions. Ask the smartest kids in each grade for suggestions. Help your classmates go beyond Wikipedia when using the Internet for a resource. Then present your findings in a visual way, with chunky text and visuals that make it easy to read and to use.
