Wasting time or studying?

Children and teens can spend hours browsing through YouTube videos and sharing the jokes and spicy bits, but now some students are discovering that YouTube also offer help with classes. Math is an especially difficult subject for many students and a visual approach can make it easier. More than 50,000 people have watched some of these videos on calculus, algebra, and other complicated subjects. Once again librarians should take note of a development that may affect the way young people use library collections. While books continue to be the basis for teaching in most areas, supplementary materials add a lot to the mix. Rather than libraries having to buy AV products--remember all those filmstrips we used to have?--they can now link to valuable free material online. Of course, the usual problem of sorting the best from the shoddy misleading products is a vital service. But think how useful it will be to be able to offer teachers and students a vetted list of supplementary materials available free both in school and at home. Another valuable resource brought to us by technology.