Raising a child is not the easiest thing to do. I’m sure every parent can agree that it is exactly the opposite of easy.
If parents are like superheroes when they strive to meet all the needs of their one, two, seven or ten mini humans at home, then how should we call teachers, who do the same all day — but with 15 to 30 children? Super-superheroes? I’ll go with that.
Super-superheroes, more commonly known as elementary teachers, know how hard it can be to make 30 pairs of sparkly eyes look at the same thing and engage in the learning process at the same time.
At least two reasons contribute to this:
The short attention span and the high energy levels
The attention span of humans — young and old — is said to have been surpassed by that of the cute goldfish from the fish-tank. 8 seconds is a hell of a short time to hook students’ attention and guide it through the at-least-one-hour learning process. Teachers really need some super-super powers to do that.
Kids at school actually need their learning materials delivered in bite-sized, digestible chunks, rather than one hard-to-swallow class.
They get easily distracted and they can’t really sit still for a long period of time. It’s only natural. The human body was designed for movement and activity; that’s how kids burn their high levels of energy — through moving and playing.
Yet, despite these biological characteristics, school systems everywhere stubbornly impose students to sit still and pay attention for a longer, thus not so comfortable, period of time.
It’s really hard to change the system, but steps are taken in the right direction.
How interactive videos can impact classroom learning
Interactive videos have great potential to improve the current situation of students’ learning because they are usually short, and because they are, well, interactive. But you should take this with a grain of salt, as interactive videos may not be the perfect solution for every classroom; at least not yet.
Videos are known to be the most successful learning materials in terms of engagement and retention rates. The brain is active on almost all sensorial levels when watching videos, grabbing kids’ attention and helping them better remember what they learn.
But videos still require students to sit still in front of a screen, even though for a rather short period of time.
So the way to deliver a video must be as important as the learning content in it.
Interactivity in learning videos can come at different levels, from simple clicks on different parts of the screen, making items move in a certain way, to 360-degree views. When creating an online course as a set of interactive videos, teachers can have various technologies to work with. Of course, there’s no need for the latest one, or the most expensive method, in order to successfully hold students’ attention and guide them through the entire course.
And now comes the grain of salt: interactive video technology is still under tests. It does promise a lot — higher engagement rates, better retention rates, a more exciting learning experience — but it is still far from being the norm in online learning, and especially in most schools.
The technology advancements can make this possible though, perhaps faster that we can imagine.
What’s your opinion about the use of interactive videos in the classroom? How long do you think it will take until each student will learn from such resources? The comments section awaits your input.
Livia is one of the online voices of NEO by CYPHER LEARNING. She writes about education technology for K-12 and higher ed, gamification, BYOD, as well as other ed-tech subjects.
Good post!
One of the most interesting and challenging aspects of becoming a teacher is learning how to deliver your passion and motivation as well, to your students. It is also one of the most important. Students who are not motivated will not learn more effectively than any other who doesn’t. They won’t retain information, they won’t participate and some of them may even become disruptive. A student may be unmotivated for a variety of reasons: They may feel that they have no interest in the subject, find the teacher’s methods old fashioned or un-engaging or even be distracted by external forces.
And please do not forget that not all students will respond to lessons in the same way. For some, hands-on experiences may be the best. Others may love to read books quietly or to work in groups. In order to keep all students motivated, mix up your lessons so that students with different preferences will each get time focused on the things they like best. Doing so will help students stay engaged and pay attention. And it is also a true fact that when teaching to a class full of students it can be really difficult to truly personalize the learning experience for each. No matter how passionate and savvy the teacher is. Of course, any good teacher will adapt and adjust the content to the class level, but it can’t be done at every student level, at least not in the four-walls classroom.
But it would be absolutely beneficial not only for the learners but for the teaching process as well, if the teacher could give his students the chance to start thinking instead of giving ready-made knowledge to them. An interactive video of a specific learning subject could trigger out the dialogue and the collaboration among them in the classroom and it could contribute to the building a bridge between what is taught and what is really understood.
This is exactly the point of the Socratic Method, that we have the honor to apply in our courses and live sessions, through NEO LMS Collaboration tools and our passionate e-tutors as well!!
http://www.arnos.gr