YouTube is one of the most challenging EDU applications to manage. It’s filled with good, and distracting content that is impossible to fully separate.
Today I’m outlining two YouTube configuration strategies to help you manage student access to YouTube. I’ve worked with districts that successfully use both options, so there’s no one-size fits all solution.
The distracting nature of YouTube is not a problem that can be solved through administrative policies alone. Effective classroom management by teachers is key to implementation of either approach.
Option 1: Disable YouTube for students
Turning off the YouTube service for student OUs will prevent access to YouTube.com. While this might seem drastic, there’s actually an interesting follow-up to this configuration.
Teachers can assign YouTube videos to students through Google Classroom, Slides and Sites even if YouTube is disabled for students. This arrangement allows teachers to take responsibility for reviewing and selecting appropriate YouTube content for students. The IT department is NOT involved in unblocking specific videos, channels, etc.
Related Post: 7 ways to create a video lesson with YouTube
Note: this configure can potentially block content embedded in other applications like EdPuzzle and links in textbook applications. Make sure you test your specific learning environment before implementing this strategy.
Option 2: YouTube content filtering
The second YouTube configuration strategy provides filtered access to YouTube. This can be done with Google’s built-in admin console policies OR a content filter such as GoGuardian, Securly, or Lightspeed.
Note: I do NOT recommend using BOTH the admin console and your web filter to manage YouTube content. This results in a confusing tangle of policies that will be difficult to manage. Pick one or the other!
The admin console offers several filtering options for YouTube content:
A few notes on the 9+, 13+, 18+ YouTube configuration:
- In order for this policy to work correctly you must adjust your YouTube network settings.
- There is very little difference between the 9+ and 13+ policies.
- History videos are frequently blocked because of violence (those Romans were wild!)
- Teachers can manually approve a video that students are unable to access
- Non-academic, entertainment content (i.e. Dude Perfect, Mr. Beast, etc) is NOT blocked
- The 18+ policy blocks very little content
- IT admins can review manually approved videos here.
Closing up YouTube loopholes
As you have probably observed, students discover lots of loopholes for accessing YouTube. Here are three known exploits and some solutions for them.
- Canva embed – If your school uses Canva, students can access the internal YouTube app to view and share videos. This feature can be easily disabled with a district Canva account (free).
- Google Docs preview – By adding a YouTube link to a document, students can watch video through the preview pop-up. This typically happens when a student creates a document using a personal account which is shared with a school account. xFanatical SafeDoc is a paid Chrome extension ($899/year for one domain) that will prevent this action and several other YouTube loopholes in Forms, Slides, and Sites.
- Eaglercraft internal browser – Eaglercraft and many other javascript applications have an internal browser that can’t be seen by your web filter. Blocking locally run javascript will prevent access to these types of tools.
Related Post: Manage Canva education with the Google admin console
The ultimate solution: classroom management
While the policies listed above are helpful, they are no substitute for teacher classroom management. Simply put: students should not have un-guided time on their Chromebooks. If devices are in-use, there should be clear instructions, expectations, and consequences for off-task behavior. If you are an EDU Plus district, the new Class Tools feature gives teachers the ability to manage student devices. This includes blocking sites like YouTube.com for the duration of their class. This feature is included with the EDU Plus package of tools.
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