I really enjoy using short (2-5) video clips in my classroom to enrich learning, break-up a lesson a bit, and what I've really been focusing on recently: making connections to the content we're studying and the world today. Two examples I have from the Industrialization/Labor & Society Units are connected to child labor and pollution. For child labor, we did the Sadler Report activity and then watched this video on child labor in Nepal. Naturally, it's unsettling to watch, but makes several connections to the Ind. Rev. activity so that students can make these connections.
Another example is by using this video on John Snow's ability to track the cholera outbreak in Industrial London and the polluted water crisis in several cities in modern India in this video. If you're going to use this one, start watching at 16:45. Students seems to appreciate and understand these important connections. It's still early on in the school year and I was wondering if others have made similar to connections via short videos in other units.
