I have compiled a fairly extensive list of sites which allow for the streaming of documentaries. Most of the documentaries can be classed as educational, some content is fairly cutting edge and thought provoking so be warned and choose wisely. We in no way endorse the views expressed in any of these programs! You will find many provocative but also informative documentaries. These sites mainly cater for the American audience with a lot of political views being expressed. However you can also find some real gems like the complete BBC documentary 'Planet Earth'.
Its worth noting that the sites listed below generally do not host the actual video footage. Often they are just embedded links to other video hosts such as YouTube, Google Video 0r Vimeo. This is worth remembering because if you would like to share these videos with your class but not get them distracted with other content, just grab the embed code from the host and place the videos in your own wiki or website. If you need help doing this let us know.
In no particular order take a look at the below documentary sites.
Free Documentary TV -Â http://www.freedocumentary.tv
Top Documentary Films - http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/watch-online/
Documentary Heaven -Â http://documentaryheaven.com
Documentary Wire - http://www.documentarywire.com
Watch Free Documentaries - http://watchfreedocumentaries.net
Short Film clips with a heavy focus on education - http://aso.gov.au/education/
Other Resources worth checking out are:
PBS LearningMedia is a dynamic platform offering the best of public media content and produced specifically for PreK-16 teachers. With free access to over 14,000 high-quality resources tied to national standards, teachers can download, save and share exactly what they need for an inspired classroom experience.
If you feel like embracing legal Torrent sharing this is a good place to start. We will cover the basics of bit torrents in a future article.
OneBigTorrent.org is a new place for sharing material that deals with or is relevant to issues of social justice, progressive and radical politics, independent media, ecology. We run a local bittorrent tracker (which we encourage uploaders to use), and we also host torrents from other trackers, as well as ed2K and Magnet links.
There cannot be a formal definition of what content we deem appropriate for upload. If the concepts above don't suit you, browse the index -- you'll get the idea quickly. We typically remove obscure stuff dealing with UFOs, mind-control, secret societies, Black Helicopters and what have you. The net is full of this bs anyway.
We hope that you find these links useful. Don't forget to bookmark this page if you want to refer back later.