The Blog of The Video Math Tutor

I finally had a chance to re-design my e-store to make it look more modern. The rest of the videomathtutor.com site will soon follow.

Click on the image to visit:

I just created a new domain: mathpodcast.com. I got it through Yahoo. They offer unlimited storage and bandwidth, and at a good price too! What I want to do with this site is to have Apple TV quality video podcasts. The site is under construction, but I am excited about this. I don’t know if these videos can be streaming, but I will try. If not, you will need to download the huge files before watching. We shall see…

I enjoy placing videos here on .Mac, but it severely limits the bandwidth, since I have many videos (and more are on the way!). Nearly every month my alloted bandwidth approaches the maximum allowed.

Today I did my first private tutoring session using a webcam. I used Skype for the connection. It was quite an experience tutoring someone this way. I am used to doing face-to-face and small group sessions, but never with a camcorder. The student needed help with the math portion of the GMAT test she is taking at the beginning of next month. She paid using PayPal. She liked the session and will be doing more tutoring with me for the next few weeks.

This is something I always wanted to try, but is something I don’t think I will be much of, since I do need to dedicate my time to making my math videos. At least now I also know I can help students if they have specific questions on topics not yet covered in my videos. Also, the possibility exists I can do video conferencing calls to help small groups, if need be.

I see this more as an experiment. It went well, but there was some tweaking along the way.

I finally have a TI-nspire graphing calculator. I will go over it and determine if this is a calculator I want to incorporate in future math lessons. There seems to bit of a learning curve, but I have a knack for learning how to use calculators, so it won’t take long for me to become an expert.

Only the Windows version of the computer software is out now, but the mac version is to be released later this year. I’m using Parallels Desktop so that I can run the software on my MacBook.

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Online Remediation and Enrichment Tool From Pearson
Now Includes Video Math Tutoring

Engaging, Entertaining Instruction From The Video Math Tutor Complements Perspective’s Learning Resources

ORLANDO, Fla. – Jan. 22, 2008 – Today at the 2008 Florida Educational Technology Conference, Pearson announced that Perspective™, the company’s powerful online remediation and enrichment tool for students, now offers tutoring videos from VideoMathTutor.com. Perspective provides students, families and educators with a roadmap to student improvement through enrichment and remediation resources tailored to student needs.
Hosted by Luis Anthony Ast, also known as “The Video Math Tutor,” the entertaining and engaging videos, aligned to state standards, focus on mathematics topics that students most frequently have difficulty learning. Ast is a professional tutor with 24 years of experience tutoring students in junior high through college level mathematics.
“We developed Perspective and the Learning Locator to provide states with a way to deliver high-quality, relevant content that directly addresses student needs based on their state test performance,” said Douglas Kubach, president and CEO, Assessment and Information, Pearson. “We are pleased to add The Video Math Tutor’s video segments to Perspective’s rich pool of Pearson and partner-created learning resources. Mr. Ast’s friendly demeanor will engage students and make learning mathematics fun.”
Perspective features a friendly, easy-to-understand overview of a student’s performance on assessments for teachers and families. It is tied to deeper and broader Web reports and resources that align to state-specific standards. Class reports detailing all of the students entering a teacher’s class allow educators to prepare with advance knowledge of past performance. Perspective helps families understand how students are doing, helps educators prepare for their classes, and details what both can do to help each student succeed.
With its Learning Locator™ functionality, Perspective provides students with resources, such as these mathematics tutoring videos, that directly map to student performance on state-wide, high-stakes, summative assessments and are designed to enrich and improve students’ knowledge and skills. Through a licensing agreement between Pearson and VideoMathTutor.com, students, families and educators can access the videos via Perspective’s Learning Resource Library. Educators may also assign videos through Perspective’s custom Assignment Sheet functionality.
“As a professional tutor, I want to use the most effective method for engaging students in mathematics and helping them to achieve at the highest levels,” said Ast. “Through VideoMathTutor.com, I provide high-quality video offering experienced, professional instruction. Now students using Perspective will have access to my tutoring videos that will help them master mathematics.”
These Web-optimized video segments are now available at no additional charge to existing Perspective customers via the Perspective Web portal.
To learn more about The Video Math Tutor, visit http://www.videomathtutor.com. To learn more about Perspective and the Learning Locator, visit http://www.pearsonperspective.com .

About Pearson
Pearson is the global leader in educational publishing, assessment, information and services, helping people of all ages to learn at their own pace, in their own way. For students preK-12, Pearson provides effective and innovative curriculum products in all available media, educational assessment and measurement for students and teachers, student information systems, and teacher professional development and certification programs. The company’s respected brands include Scott Foresman, Prentice Hall, AGS, PowerSchool, SuccessMaker, TeacherVision and many others. Pearson’s comprehensive offerings help inform targeted instruction and intervention so that success is within reach of every student. Pearson’s other primary businesses include the Financial Times Group and the Penguin Group.

About VideoMathTutor.com
Luis Anthony Ast is The Video Math Tutor. The Video Math Tutor engages students and aids them in improving their achievement by presenting mathematics concepts in entertaining and innovative ways. A full-time professional math tutor, Ast offers his VideoMathTutor.com videos for sale on his VideoMathTutor.com Web site. He is also available in the Phoenix, Ariz., area for personal tutoring consultations in English or Spanish.

For more information, press only:
Lisa Wolfe, L. Wolfe Communications, 773-325-9935, lwolfe@lwolfe.com

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OK, it’s only ONE 2-Disc DVD, but I have to start SOMEWHERE!

The DVDs will be sold through a website called CreateSpace.com and also on Amazon.com. I hope you can show your support by buying my videos. The more you buy, the more I make, and in turn, the better grades you (or your students) will earn! What a deal!

Click HERE for more information!

I have finally placed my first video online that can be rented or bought online, then downloaded. This way, you can rent or own the Lesson right away, and not wait days for the DVD to arrive in the mail. I only have “Introduction to Algebra” available, but others will be added over time.

Unfortunately, it can only be viewed using Windows, not Mac OS X.

The only bad thing about this is that you don’t get the Printable Lesson Notes in PDF format. That will only be made available to those that purchase the DVDs. the DVD will also have the Lessons in other formats as well (like iPod, iPhone, and Apple TV).

To see this link, click HERE.

I recently purchased more .Mac storage space so that there should not be any more problems with data transfer rates being exceeded during any given biweekly period (unless my site becomes VERY popular). I now have 30 Gigs to play with and a data transfer limit of 300 GBs.

In other news, I have not been able to get more videos here because of a lack of memory to create DVDs. I just ordered a new 500GB external hard drive from MacMall. It should arrive sometime this coming week. With it, I should be able to re-do all my past videos in a higher quality format and create the much anticipated DVDs. So far, I have only been able to do Basic Math, Lesson 6.

First, some praise for Apple:

My Basic Math Podcast is FINALLY visible on the Apple iTunes web site. Thanks Apple! This happened a few days ago. The main image was not looking good, so I changed it. The change was reflected later. Apple also had the good sense of increasing the memory allocated to us .Mac users, so now I am able to get ALL my videos onto here in podcast form. I am working on that now.

Now, I need to slap Apple on the wrist:

Apple still has not answered my recent request to sell my videos in their iTunes store. It’s sad that a lifelong Apple user has to rely on WINDOWS MEDIA for the only way to sell videos online. At least I can provide videos for the Apple TV and iPod/iPhone in my DVD-ROMs. They are in QuickTime movie format on this web site.

I have been busy trying to create DVD-ROMs for my videos. This is a rather painstaking process, but once done, should provide my customers with some nice goodies that will supplement my DVD-Rs.

“Facebook” should be called “Pain-in-the-Buttbook”:

I leaned facebook.com is allowing all to join it. I thought it would be a good idea to join, since it predominantly has students that I can help. My plan was to join, upload all my free videos, and hope students from all over the world would see them!

Well, in my opinion, it is very poorly structured. I have joined other “social networking” sites, and this, by far, has been my worst experience IN YEARS. I had to join a “network” so that others can even know of my existence. I am NOT, apparently, able to be visible to EVERYONE in the U.S. I can pick a city, or perhaps a foreign country. Facebook does not provide an easy way to contact them to complain about this. I guess they get SO many complaints that they stopped providing an email address. I was able to send an email to ONE address, one provided to the Press. I’ll post here if I ever get a response. Oh, when I was playing around with my settings, I only discovered too late that I can only change my network setting twice in 2 months. TWO MONTHS! Since I made two changes, I now have NO network, NO way of others to find me, and I have to wait until October 19th to try to go on a new network. Sheesh! And from the hype I read on several internet news podcasts, facebook is supposed to be the new “in” area to see and join.

Yeah, right.

I think I’ll stick with more reliable and “user-friendly” video websites. You will see those recommended on my website (go to the FLASH area). I won’t bother with buttbook… errr… I mean facebook.

I discovered that one of the Fraction videos was defective. The audio was out of synch with the video. Not a good thing. Of course, I had discovered this right after spending DAYS creating different versions/formats of the video. Fortunately, I discovered the flaw before I finished burned the DVD of the Lesson. Whew! That would not have been good if I had done this. So I went back to the master video I had on tape and started over. Oh, well. I also decided to add more information to the individual videos to create better podcasts, so I needed to upload ALL of them back here. I’m almost out of disc space already, so I won’t be able to add all my videos until I can afford it. Sorry for making you all wait.

Another frustration is that although Apple accepted my Basic Math Podcast for its iTunes directory and provided a link, it’s nowhere to be seen on their web site. I will get a link to it on my main videomathtutor.com web site, but it would be nice to have it featured in iTunes. Oh, well.