Currently, every student in my technology classes learns a curriculum of my own creation. The curriculum teaches important 21st century literacy skills and is challenging. On the other hand, it is a single curriculum and does not cater to individual students. I would like to offer three different curricula in the same class to better engage different types of interests. For example, I could teach basic programming (Scratch), analysis (Excel) and creativity (Turtleart or Photoshop). The big stumbling block is how to teach three courses simultaneously. The answer is video.
There is research that shows students lose nothing by watching videos instead of attending live lectures (see full article). The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee studied 5,000 students over two years. Students who watched the videos 12% better on the same cumulative test than students who took the traditional course. The outperformance of the video watchers came despite the fact that video learners had generally lower grades than the lecture attendees. Moreover, the online model was particularly successful for disadvantaged or underprepared students
On a side note, I also saw a video at EduCon that showed a math teacher having students watch a 10-15 minute instructional video for homework. Class time was reserved for students doing problems and collaborating. Students seemed to like the video idea for homework because it fit nicely into their world of multimedia and multitasking. If I can master video in my technology class, maybe this s worth a shot.
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