Turning Web Videos to Empowering Lessons with Ted Ed - Thoughts and Cautions

Ted Ed is a platform for creating coherent, meaningful lessons around a digital video. A youtube, hulu, or other video can be housed on the Ted Ed platform, and paired with comprehension and analytical questions about the video content, organized links to further avenues of student exploration, and discussion boards. Educators can track student responses, whether or not the student registers as a TedEd user. 

What Can You Do with Ted Ed?

The process is simple: find a video you want to use (Ted Ed even has a search tool that searches multiple online video platforms for you), upload it, and create context, comprehension and analysis questions, collections of further digital learning opportunities, and discussion boards. It’s simple, and cleanly organized. The tool requires almost no modeling-- it’s pretty close to plug and play-- educators could create a lesson together in a matter of minutes-- a couple of pages of instruction in an email could get teachers off and running, or in ten minutes of a faculty meeting, a group of teachers could build a sample lesson together. 

Student Exploration and Empowered Student Learning

One of the interesting fields in a Ted Ed lesson  is the “Dig Deeper” field, which allows teachers to provide context and links to other web resources-- images, articles, museums, etc. It provides a simple, un-intimidating way for students to begin their digital journey beyond the video itself and your own questions about it. The discussion field could be easily designed to then ask students to summarize what else they’ve explore, to post new resources they’ve found for their classmates. 

Student and Teacher Participation: Possibilities and Cautions

It would be simple for students to take this tool and create their own lessons-- to have them think about what knowledge a student should gain from a video, what questions a student should ponder, what resources they could add, what discussion questions they could pose. Students could use teacher Ted Ed lessons as models for their own Ted Ed lesson. 

In turning Ted Ed into a tool for student content creation, however, teachers should take care to tread lightly. The Ted brand, particularly the Ted Talk brand, has been criticized for flattening and simplifying deep intellectual concepts, so that the talks appear more inspiring, turning intellectual lectures into American Idol where ideas are valued because they are “awesome, inspirational and unchallenging.” The Ted brand has even been the target of some pretty acute and astute satire:

All of this is to say that the Ted Ed website will nudge students toward creating their own content, becoming part of the Ted Ed world, a world that encourages them ask “How can their idea change the world?” Then upload their video to youtube, under Ted branding, to share their idea with “friends, family, and the entire world.” The language here is very much the language of problem-based and project-based learning: students are to be “inspired”, they are to “explore” and “share globally”, and there are plenty of images on the Ted Ed website of hip students actively empowered and leaping with love for their learning and sharing:  

I think any educator would want to approach “branded” learning activities with caution, especially brands so often accused of simplifying complex questions in order to prioritize creating the sensation of insight at the expense of the thorny complexity of real learning.

Similarly, the Ted Ed website pushes teachers toward the Ted Ed Masterclass website, which flatters their “brilliance” and “innovation” while urging them to “surface” their school or district’s ideas through buoying power of the Ted brand. 

Ted Ed Transformations and ISTE Standards

There is a real utility to Ted Ed-- the platform makes creating lessons for flipped, blended or remote classrooms relatively painless. There are ways, as I’ve outlined above, to push students to develop as technologically competent students in ways outlined by the ISTE standards. Using the simple tools of the Ted Ed platform can help them build the foundation to become knowledge constructors (ISTE Student Standard 3) , particularly, seeing first a model from their teacher that collects videos, asks questions, curates further research, and then being pushed to curate their own research and digital sources. A Ted Ed lesson could then be a jumping off point for students to begin thinking about ways to creatively communicate (ISTE Student Standard 6)  their own learning. 

The process could also be a lesson in responsible digital citizenship (ISTE Student Standard 2), as students begin to ask themselves what their digital identity is and who controls that. When setting up a Ted Ed lesson, teachers have the option of requiring students create their own Ted Ed account. 

Talking with students about that choice, and talking about what their identity as learners is, independent of the Ted brand identity, can be an important lesson, too. 

Colonial Project Newspapers

Students in Mr. Nekrosius's humanities project groups recently researched, wrote, and designed online newspapers about the Salem Witch Trials. To learn more, there is a link to the newspapers below.

For Mr. Drogos's humanities classes, here is your blog post assignment:


Choose ONE of the online newspapers created by Mr. Nekrosius's project groups and spend twenty-to-thirty minutes browsing through the various pages (you can find links to the two newspapers here). When have finished reading the newspaper, post a comment in which you write the following:

1.Three things you learned about the trials and/or the people of Salem--be specific, and be thorough.
2. A detailed connection between the events of Salem and the events you studied for your project (or, if you are in Mr. Nekrosius's project group, a connection between something you read and something you wrote for your own article.)
3. One question for an author or one of the designers of the newspapers.

(If you are in Mr. Nekrosius's project groups, you should post on the other class's newspaper.)

Remember:

You should include ONLY your first name and your class period (NO LAST NAMES) at the end of your blog post.

Also, remember to be positive, constructive, and detailed in your responses! Your posts are due Tuesday, November 27th.

Debate Extra Credit

Tonight is the first of three presidential election debates (there will be one vice-presidential debate). The debate tonight is meant to focus on domestic policy-- issues affecting only the United States itself. As you watch the debate, ask yourself the following questions. Answer the questions in several complete sentences each on this blog.

1. What makes for a strong response to the questions, in your opinion? Support your claim with an example from the debate.

2. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the debate format? How does the format of the debate shape the discussion? Support your answer with an example. How would you change the debate format?

3. What "domestic policy" questions did not get discussed, that you think were important?

Please remember to be respectful of others. This forum itself is not a debate forum-- it's a chance for you to reflect on the format of the debates, and the benefits and limitations of that format.

The Themes of American Born Chinese

Now that you have read most of  American Born Chinese, you should be able to see certain themes emerging that appear in all three different story lines within the graphic novel. Your assignment is to describe one of those emerging themes and explain, using specific examples from the text, how you see each of the three story lines embodying or developing that theme. Your post should be at least six sentences long. You may choose to write your answer in paragraph form if you wish. If you are unsure on what the definition of "theme" is, consult your literary term glossary at the back of Social Justice. Your comment is due by the start of class on Thursday.


Remember--read the post, and then click on the word "comments" just below that post. After you have written your post, add your first name and last initial, then "Drogos," then your period (so, Calvin H. Drogos 1-2). Then, select "Anonymous" for your identity and click "publish your comment."

Escaping the Box

We have spent the past week and a half discussing questions surrounding identity and culture. As part of those discussions, we you have read several stories and a poem, listened to music,  written in journals, and created identity collages to express your own unique cultural identifiers. We have also discussed various examples of "the box," which is a metaphor for any obstacles or barriers that might isolate, frustrate, enclose, or sometimes protect someone from a larger world.

Think back over everything we have read so far for this unit ("Theme for English B," "Alone and All Together," "Sylvia's Story" from National Public Radio, "American History," "Little Boxes," "Crickets"). Your task now is to write and post a comment in this forum in which you describe a connection between at least TWO of these works, focusing on the role of "the box." Think about how different characters face similar or different challenges. Think about similarities or differences in the way characters both push against the walls of their boxes and wish they could hide inside some boxes. Do you think these characters will escape from their boxes? What kinds of factors put characters and/or people in boxes? Are the "boxes" constructed by society (for example, by stereotypes), or do families and individuals create their own boxes?

When you have made a connection between at least two works, write a post describing that connection. Make sure to mention specific characters/narrators, and to be clear about how the "boxes" they experience are similar. These posts do not need to be long: about four sentences, give or take one, will do. Your post should be in the form of a  paragraph with evidence and examples directly from the text(s). You should feel free to respond to your classmates' posts, as well as to ask your classmates questions.

*** Remember to use your first name and "Drogos Period ___" when you sign your post. Also, if you choose to respond to what another classmate wrote, please do so in a respectful manner.

Alone and All Together

 
We've read two stories and one poem this week about community, belonging and exclusion: "Theme for English B," "American History" and "Alone and All Together." Think about what the three stories have in common. What is their shared message about identity and community? How do they differ? Please write two questions that you would like to ask the class to discuss tomorrow. The questions should be open-ended, not empirical. You may wish to ask about the essays' meaning, you may wish to ask about the symbols and figurative language you saw in the stories and what they mean.

One question should be only about "Alone and All Together." The second question should incorporate or should be applicable to two or all three readings. 

Write your questions in the comment section below. In order for you to submit your comment, be sure you are first logged out of any google account.

Second, click on "Comments," then "Add a Comment."

Third, write your two questions, numbered one and two.

Fourth, in the drop down menu select "Comment As: Name and URL."

Fifth, type in, as your name, your first name, your last initial, my name, and your period of humanities. For example, if your name is Bob Loblaw and you have Mr. Drogos in the morning, you would write, "Bob L. Drogos 1-2" DO NOT WRITE YOUR WHOLE NAME. 

Last, click publish. Your comment will not appear right away. I will have to approve it first.

You can email me with questions.

Good Luck!

Welcome Back!

 

Welcome to 7th Grade Humanities and welcome back to Lab! This week we'll be introducing a couple important ideas that will serve us for the next few months and throughout the year. We'll introduce ourselves to each other, to the course and its procedures, and to our first unit: Identity. Over the next couple months, we'll spend a lot of time examining what determines the identity of a person, a group, and a culture. We'll read non-fiction, poetry, graphic narratives; and we'll write-- a lot! I hope you are as excited as I am to begin the year!

If you are looking for homework for humanities class, you can find this week's schedule and assignments here.

I will use this page for group and class discussion, and occasionally to post links to other sites. Remember, if you post on the blog:  

1. Use your first name, your last initial, and the class you are in. For example, I would sign my posts as: Joe (my first name) D. (my last initial) Drogos 1-2 or Drogos 6-7 (the classes I'm in.)

2. Be respectful and thoughtful.

3. All comments are moderated before they are published.