Episode #5 - Loom

SHOW NOTES

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TRANSCRIPT (full transcript link)

Hello and welcome to episode number five of the one-five. I am your podcast hostess - Tricia Louis - the self-designated tech goddess and I will be coming to you weekly in this audio podcast format with great edtech tools, tips, and tricks.

In this week’s episode, I will be talking about Loom. Loom is a screen & video recorder. Now I know there are a lot of products that fit this category. Some you may have heard of or used before would be screencastify, screencast-o-matic, or even the “grand-daddy” of them all - camtasia. Now I have used all of these tools as well, but I can tell you when I need to make a quick video to explain something, it is Loom that I reach for every time. 

One of the reasons why I use Loom is its price point. Loom is FREE for educators, you can simply sign up for Loom with an institution email account (your google account is the easiest in) and then submit the verification request via a google form. I have included links to the account creation & verification request form in the show notes. The verification process does not take more than a couple days and then you can use loom. The education account allows you to have unlimited videos in your library and the time limitation on recording a video is 45 minutes. Honestly, in my opinion, you probably should not be making videos over 45 minutes in length, so that should not be an issue. 

Another reason I like loom is that it works great as a chrome extension. There is also an installable program for mac and pc that does have a couple more features in it (the best feature being able to record system audio with the installed version) but for the most part, you should be able to record almost all your videos with the chrome extension.

Recording a video in loom is as simple as clicking that chrome extension and choosing if you want to have your camera on with the screen or without or just the camera alone. If you have multiple monitors in your setup, you can choose which screen you want to record. Then you just simply press record and start your video. There are also drawing tools and mouse emphasis tools if you are doing a screen recording that can help you explain your process. You can pause your recording and then resume in the same session. When you are done, a new tab opens up and there is your video!

You can do a little editing - like trimming the ends of the video, but if you are looking for a full-fledged video editor, loom is not your tool. But, you can take that recording you just made in loom and download an mp4 and then import into another editing program - this is what I do when I want to use camtasia to kind of “fancy up” a video! Also the downloaded mp4 can be used in edpuzzle if you utilize that video quiz tool!

But if you are happy with your video in loom, you simply click the link icon at the top right and you get a sharable link to your video - no permissions to have to worry about - the link just works! When people get your link to watch, they can use emoji reactions to your video which is a great way to get quick feedback. You are also notified when your video is watched for the first time and loom keeps track of how many times each video is watched!

A great bonus feature of loom is the automatic transcript it generates from your video - you can review the transcript and correct any mistakes in the transcript and then the person that is viewing the video can have the transcript up while watching and even use the transcript to skip around to different points in the video. You can even copy the transcript with one click to paste in any word processing program!

Your videos are stored in the cloud and then you can go back to your library and reshare the links at any time. If you make your titles very descriptive there is even a search feature in your library so you can find a video quickly.

All-in-all, loom is a great way for you to record videos for your classroom or learning space. I encourage you to give it a try!

If you have any questions about the content shared in this podcast, you are free to contact me at any time through the contact me section on my website - tricialouis.com - or via social media. You can find me AT talouis on twitter or AT talouistech on facebook or instagram.

If you like this podcast, consider supporting it by going to buymeacoffee.com/talouis and pledging your contribution to the one-five.

Keep in mind the information shared on this podcast may take additional clearances from your tech department to work properly in your district, school, or classroom. I have vetted all of the information  shared on this podcast and it is available and/or correct on the date the podcast is originally published. But, remember that services, sites, or products can change or become unavailable without a lot of notice. 

Thanks for listening and join me next week for another episode of the one five!