Each video on the TED-Ed site is tagged to a curriculum subject and is accompanied by supplementary materials to help teachers and students use or understand the video lesson.

TED, a nonprofit organization devoted to spreading big ideas through a series of conferences and a free video platform, has continued its expansion into education by launching a brand-new TED-Ed website with tools to help teachers use video in the classroom.

The new platform allows educators to customize videos with follow-up questions and assignments, TED says—an initiative that could help power the “flipped learning” model.

This is the second phase of TED’s expansion into education, following the launch of a TED-Ed YouTube channel last month with several educational videos. (See “Free video lessons offered by leaders in innovation, thinking.”) Five weeks after its launch, the channel has attracted more than 2.4 million views, 42,000 subscribers, and more than 3,000 comments, TED says.

With the new TED-Ed platform, “you can use, tweak, or completely redo any lesson featured on TED-Ed, or create lessons from scratch based on any video from YouTube,” the organization says.

In other words, the site allows users to take any useful educational video, not just TED’s, and easily create a customized lesson around the video. Users can distribute the lessons, publicly or privately, and track their impact on a class or an individual student.

See also:

Why Khan Academy is so popular—and why teachers shouldn’t feel threatened

Flipped learning: A response to five common criticisms

Empowering Education with Video

Teachers also can browse TED content based on the subject they teach. Each video on the TED-Ed site is tagged to a curriculum subject and is accompanied by supplementary materials to help teachers and students use or understand the video lesson. Supplementary materials include multiple-choice questions, open-answer questions, and links to more information on the topic.

But the most innovative feature of the site is that educators can customize these elements using a new functionality called “flipping.” When a video is flipped, the supplementary materials can be edited, and the resulting lesson is rendered on a new and private web page. The creator of the lesson then can distribute it and track an individual student’s progress as he or she completes the assignment.

What’s more, visitors to the site are not restricted to flipping the featured TED-Ed videos: They also can create a lesson from scratch using any video from YouTube that permits third-party embedding. Users can offer these lessons for wider distribution, and the best of them will be featured on the TED-Ed site for others to make use of.

Sal Khan’s nonprofit now contains more than 3,100 free video tutorials, mostly on math and science—but the site has begun expanding its scope to other subjects, too.

Sal Khan, whose online Khan Academy serves up video tutorials to more than 6 million students worldwide each month, wants to reassure teachers that the free educational service isn’t out to take their jobs—nor is it a statement about a teacher’s ability to deliver a lesson effectively.

On the contrary, Khan said, teachers who are using the service with their students feel more empowered than ever.

“It liberates the classroom,” he told attendees of the National School Boards Association’s 72^nd annual conference in Boston, “and teachers’ creativity comes out.”

Warm and engaging, with a self-deprecating sense of humor, Khan discussed his nonprofit venture during an April 22 keynote speech to a few thousand school board members, who interrupted him with frequent rounds of applause.

Khan Academy now contains more than 3,100 free video tutorials, mostly on math and science—but the site has begun expanding its scope to other subjects, too.

What started as an idea to tutor his 12-year-old cousin Nadia from a distance in 2004 has now surpassed 140 million lessons streamed online and is helping 10 times more students learn each month than the entire number of students who’ve graduated from Harvard University since 1636, Khan said.

And the reason for the website’s success is simple: Students can access the content “when and how they want it.”

When he first posted his video tutorials on YouTube in 2006, his relatives said they liked the YouTube versions better than Khan’s live tutoring, because they were more comfortable watching the videos privately on their own time. No one was looking over their shoulder, or waiting for them to indicate they understood the material before moving on.

See also:

Flipped learning: A response to five common criticisms

In fact, this ability to engage with the content in private—over and over again, if necessary—was cited as a key advantage in a video testimonial that Khan showed of a man who was able to earn a degree in electrical engineering with help from Khan Academy.

After admitting that he’d had to watch some of the website’s videos 20 or 30 times before understanding their high-level math concepts, the man noted: “There’s no [human] tutor who could sit with me and go over the same material 20 or 30 times.”

In 2009, encouraged by the reaction his video tutorials were getting on YouTube, Khan took a leap of faith, quit his day job as a hedge fund analyst, and established Khan Academy as a nonprofit organization. The site eventually caught the attention of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, whose Gates Foundation supported it with a $2 million grant. Google also has contributed $2 million, allowing Khan to hire staff and pursue his dream of “providing a free, world-class education to anyone, anywhere.”

Now, the site’s video tutorials are sequenced, so students can move through increasing levels of competency on the path to mastery. This is how video games work, Khan said—but until now, it’s not how schools traditionally have operated.

One of the reasons this debate exists is because there is no true definition of what “flipped learning” is.

Over the past two years, the Flipped Learning method has created quite a stir. Some argue that this teaching method will completely transform education, while others say it is simply an opportunity for boring lectures to be viewed in new locations.

While the debate goes on, the concept of Flipped Learning is not entirely new. Dr. Eric Mazur of Harvard University has been researching this type of learning since the early ’90s, and other educators have been applying pieces of the Flipped Learning method for even longer.

It’s our opinion that one of the reasons this debate exists is because there is no true definition of what Flipped Learning is. The method is often simplified to videos being watched at home and homework being done at school. If this is the definition, then we should all be skeptical. Instead, we should look closer at Dr. Mazur’s work. The components he includes in his implementation make for a thoughtful, rigorous experience.

Read more about Eric Mazur’s teaching method here.

Mazur will be one of several education innovators presenting at the 2012 Building Learning Communities conference in Boston, July 15-20.

Hosted by November Learning, this premier event is designed to have an immediate and long-term impact on improving teaching and learning. This year’s conference will feature a keynote speech from Chris Anderson, curator of the TED Conference and TED Talks that share wisdom from thought leaders worldwide.

For more information about BLC ’12, click here. Get $50 off when you register by entering this discount code: eSchoolMedia12

Dr. Mazur has a video describing his integrated Flipped Learning and Peer Instruction methods, but the major points are:

• Students prepare for class by watching video, listening to podcasts, reading articles, or contemplating questions that access their prior knowledge.
• After accessing this content, students are asked to reflect upon what they have learned and organize questions and areas of confusion.
• Students then log in to a Facebook-like social tool, where they post their questions.
• The instructor sorts through these questions prior to class, organizes them, and develops class material and scenarios that address the various areas of confusion. The instructor does not prepare to teach material that the class already understands.
• In class, the instructor uses a Socratic method of teaching, where questions and problems are posed and students work together to answer the questions or solve the problems. The role of the instructor is to listen to conversations and engage with individuals and groups as needed.

With the above framework in mind, we tapped Twitter to learn what educators say are the downsides to implementing the Flipped Learning method, and we have provided our opinions that address the five major criticisms.

Implementing the Flipped Learning method makes me, as the teacher, much less important.

This could not be further from the truth! In a Flipped Learning environment, the teachers are more important than ever.

Iowa teachers can model or learn from exemplary lessons by posting or watching short videos online.

Knowing that good teaching leads to increased student achievement, the Great Prairie Area Education Agency (GPAEA) in Ottumwa, Iowa, already had legacy programs in place to coach and mentor new teachers and to highlight best practices of professional educators using video. To expand these practices and share them with others, GPAEA sought a cost-effective, easily accessible way to store and retrieve these educator-made videos to use for improved teaching and learning.

Research and common sense show that self- and shared reflection for beginning and established educators, often by viewing audio and visual recordings made in the classroom, is an important and common practice. GPAEA wanted to expand this reflective practice, and by having an online repository, the agency could integrate this program into a more cost-effective service offered to its school clients.

The GPAEA leadership team, led by then-Chief Administrator Joe Crozier and current Chief Administrator Jon Sheldahl, wanted a web-based place to store videos for ongoing professional development for and by local district educators. The catchment area of the GPAEA consists of 35 school districts, as well as a number of non-public schools, and it is one of nine in Iowa.

Because curriculum and technology staff already were in the habit of working together to ensure that the technology supports the teaching and learning and doesn’t become a hindrance or an obstacle, they were able to work together to seek a system to support their needs.

After exploring online storage and retrieval options, the GPAEA team decided not to use YouTube (the initial obvious choice) for the following reasons: They wanted a system built with educators in mind that offered a peer-reviewed system to select videos based on criteria they developed, content that was aligned to the Iowa Core Curriculum, and high-quality materials directed and focused on the resources available through the AEA. Also, many districts do not allow access to YouTube on school computers, so a safe, reliable, low-cost PD system was sought. The team decided to create a GPAEA-TV portal with the EduVision platform from JDL Horizons.

In January, iHigh launched a partnership with the mammoth internet sports site Rivals.com.

Specializing in broadcasting youth sports and activities online, the Lexington, Ky.-based company iHigh has been around for more than a decade. But thanks to some new partnerships and innovative features—including a school fundraiser—iHigh is poised for even further growth.

The company operates on the notion that internet surfers want to see the young people in their lives play sports, make trombones growl, show cattle, fly over the pommel horse, or sing opera. And it’s not limited to Kentucky or the United States: iHigh.com broadcasts videos of basketball in Puerto Rico, judo in Singapore, and band concerts, ball games, graduations, and plays from just about anywhere.

“Avenues they bring to the table were not available at our level before,” said Julian Tackett, chief executive officer of the Kentucky High School Athletic Association. “It has unbelievable growth potential. … Virtually anybody can use it.”

Said A.J. Stadelmeyer, who helps oversee iHigh content at Paul G. Blazer High School in Ashland, Ky.—including games, videos, and photos from not only the school’s athletic teams, but also its theater, band, and choir: “The parents want to see the kids. That gets the hits.”

See also:

Empowering Education with Video

Here’s how it works: Schools and other organizations sign on with iHigh.com. They get a list of equipment that works best with iHigh technology and a venue to upload videos and other school information. After initial setup, the school or group can broadcast just about any event or video it wants to. Viewers can watch live streaming video of events, or archived videos later.

How is iHigh different from YouTube, that Grand Central Station of internet video? Unlike Google-owned YouTube, iHigh provides resources to help schools figure out how to structure broadcasts, set up an online presence, and recruit advertisers. (iHigh also does not offer comment posting.)

Like Yahoo and Facebook, iHigh offers free services because of its regional and national advertising base, which it says is all high school age-appropriate. iHigh webinars, for example, are sponsored by Chevrolet.

Teachers say that even though the pilot is over, they won’t go back to the old way of teaching.

There have been many school reform trends over the past few years: student response systems, video games for math, mobile phones for learning—but none have completely transformed the notion of learning like the flipped classroom.

Flipped learning, in essence, turns the idea of traditional classroom instruction on its head by asking students to watch videos of teacher lectures for homework, then apply the lesson with the teacher in the classroom.

Using this method, proponents say, teachers have the opportunity to help students learn as individuals, and students can learn concepts more quickly.

Yet, since its takeoff, skeptics have questioned whether students have the time management skills to watch the videos at home and whether in-class work really does affect student achievement. Some have even questioned whether students and parents like the new approach, and if flipped learning is just a fad.

To help peers and skeptics better understand the concept of flipped learning, Jon Bergmann and Aaron Sams, high school science teachers and pioneers in the Flipped Class ideology, created a first-of-its kind flipped classroom “open house” on Jan. 30, which invited other educators to see how flipped learning works and what students have to say about it. The event took place in two countries, 20 states, and more than 30 cities and towns.

Watch Lake Elmo Elementary’s experience:

One of the open houses took place at Lake Elmo Elementary School in Lake Elmo, Minn. Lake Elmo, part of Stillwater Area Schools—a rural district serving more than 8,900 students in 10 elementary schools (grades K-6), two junior high schools (grades 7-9), and one high school (grades 10-12)—started a flipped learning pilot in September that ended last month. Students in fifth grade math were given iPads and earphones and asked to watch 10- to 15-minute chunks of instruction a few times per week, then were asked to complete comprehension questions via the Moodle learning management system.

For just under $5,000, Roland's VR-5 portable AV mixer and recorder is an “all-in-one” system that simplifies the production, recording, and streaming of any live event, Roland says.

Many schools are building high-quality video production studios to give their students valuable experience in recording, mixing, and producing video broadcasts—from live coverage of concerts and athletic events to student-run news programs.

Using professional-grade video equipment in these efforts can be costly, but at InfoComm 2011 in Orlando, several companies exhibited products designed to make live video production easier for schools.

For instance, Panasonic introduced a product called HDTV Producer, a full turnkey video production studio for under $20,000. Panasonic sells the HDTV Producer as an out-of-the-box system that any English or journalism teacher can set up, with no professional video production experience necessary.

The system includes two cameras with tripods, a mixer, a recorder, a 42-inch LCD monitor, a microphone and boom stand, and all necessary cabling and accessories. The idea is to enable students to learn video production whatever their school’s budget might be, Panasonic said.

“Purchasing and setting up professional video equipment to produce high-quality, [high-definition] content can be challenging and time-consuming,” said product manager John Rhodes in a press release. “With HDTV Producer, we are … making it painless for organizations to deploy a full-featured video production system with a solid-state workflow.”

For schools that already have cameras and are looking for an affordable yet professional-grade live production switcher, Blackmagic Design of Milpitas, Calif., has a solution. Blackmagic’s ATEM line of switchers starts with a basic model that runs on a software interface and includes six video inputs for about $1,000. (An eight-input model sells for $2,500, and a 16-input model sells for about $5,000.)

If a software-based control panel doesn’t meet your needs, the company also sells full broadcast panels that start at $5,000.

Boston University’s College of Communication is using Blackmagic’s ATEM 1 M/E Production Switcher and ATEM 1 M/E Broadcast Panel in its Production and Journalism studios. “The ATEM products allow us greater dexterity in our production capability,” said Assistant Professor Christophor Cavalieri, faculty advisor for the school’s student-produced news channel, in a press release. “They are great tools to train the next generation of multi-camera production professionals.”

For $5,000, schools also can purchase the VR-5 portable AV mixer and recorder from Roland Systems Group—an “all-in-one” system that simplifies the production, recording, and streaming of any live event, Roland says.

Apple's latest iPhone has many implications for education.

Apple’s iPhone 4, unveiled June 7 and set for release June 24, features a mobile video conferencing application that could increase collaboration among students at different locations and make cross-district and on-the-go meetings easier for school officials.

Video conferencing is possible with the addition of a second camera on the front of the new iPhone, in addition to a five-megapixel camera and a flash on the back. For now, the video conferencing function, FaceTime, works only if both parties to the call have an iPhone 4 and are connected over a Wi-Fi network rather than a cell phone network.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs indicated that FaceTime eventually will work over cellular networks, saying Apple needs to “work a little bit” with wireless providers to make it “ready for the future.”

The iPhone’s FaceTime feature might help school technology staff hold meetings from different locations and troubleshoot specific problems.

SysAid Technologies is one company that has launched an iPhone IT assistance application. The Helpdesk Application and SysAid IT Mobile help IT staff control service requests, including viewing, updating, filtering, and customizing requests.

IT specialists might find the FaceTime application helpful during conversations if they must identify specific messages on computer screens or relay instructions for a procedure occurring across a school district.

Various media outlets and technology enthusiasts had differing opinions of FaceTime and whether the feature would succeed.

The San Francisco Chronicle predicted that FaceTime will be a success, because mobile video conferencing “is available on a device that will achieve sufficient saturation among groups,” the Wi-Fi networks over which FaceTime is set to operate will make the application look and sound top-notch, and Apple likely will make the application very easy to use, prompting more participation.

Meanwhile, CNET pointed to a handful of reasons why the video conferencing feature might not prevail: Holding a cell phone at arm’s length to capture a continuous image of the caller’s face, while keeping one’s arm steady enough so that the image is not shaky, is not physically comfortable after a while. CNET also said that video calls are awkward by nature, and because FaceTime operates only on Wi-Fi for the time being, users will be forced to use the feature at home, at school, or in other Wi-Fi hotspots.

The news site also said that “according to Apple, FaceTime won’t support 3G this year, which is strange given that Fring, Skype, and other VoIP apps offer it.”

Mobile video conferencing might not have taken off yet, but Apple isn’t the first company to offer this capability on a mobile device. Sprint HTC EVO 4G users can video chat with the new Qik software offered on the phone. And with Fring, users can make free mobile video calls and live chats over a cellular or Wi-Fi network with other Fring members and other services such as Skype, GoogleTalk, Facebook, and more.

Apple is trying to tighten the links between the iPhone and its iPad tablet, which came out April 3. It is releasing a version of its iBooks eReading application for the iPhone, which means people could buy an eBook from Apple on either device and read it on either one as well.

That compatibility could incite more universities and iPhone-toting college students to turn to the iPad as an eReader.

Educators are forgoing professional video conferencing software for the free, easy-to-use Skype.

With school budgets continuing to shrink, many educators are turning to free or inexpensive software such as Skype, along with the web cameras that now come standard on most laptop computers, to connect with other classes or colleagues online—forgoing traditional (and more expensive) video conferencing solutions.

Numerous educators said they have used Skype in one form or another for lesson planning or instruction, with most citing its cost (or lack thereof) and ease of use as the main reason for going with the software program.

Skype offers a range of free services, including the ability to make voice or video calls and send instant messages to other Skype users. Users also can pay for services such as making calls from a PC to a landline or cell phone.

Brianna Sylver, president of Sylver Consulting and adjunct professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology’s Institute of Design in Chicago, said her Cross Cultural Research class recently collaborated with a class in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in a manner that called for video conferencing.

After using Skype to collaborate with a teacher in Sao Paulo, the graduate-level class examined the differences between home security companies in the United States and in Brazil using both the slideshow and video capabilities Skype offers.

“The students would present to one another about things they were finding, like what things home security companies in Brazil would need to know if the company wanted to expand its services to the U.S.,” she said.

Sylver said the video function was helpful when her class of 20 students broke into small groups to interact with small groups of students in Sao Paulo.

“We used the webcam capabilities to create more intimate relationships between the students,” she said. “The students would also use [Skype] for collaboration outside of class, using the chat or webcam feature.”

Teachers at New Milford High School in New Jersey also use Skype to enhance their students’ learning experiences, said New Milford principal Eric Sheninger.

“In a sociology class, students spoke to their peers at Van Meter High School in Iowa about perceptions they had of each other and how the current economic crisis is impacting each community,” Sheninger said.

“Our Holocaust class has Skyped with a historian in Israel, where he has given historical insight into the creation and use of the term ‘genocide’ and the history behind labeling the genocide that took place during World War II. He also shared scholarly information on the use of these terms from his years of experience in education at Yad Vashem—Israel’s Holocaust memorial.”

While many educators use Skype as part of their instruction, some colleges and universities use the software as a way to connect with and answer the questions of potential students and their parents.

Bob Garcia, director of admissions at Alma College in Michigan, said he sees Skype being used more and more frequently in student recruitment.

“The main advantage to our use of Skype in communications with prospective students, especially those who are abroad, is that both parties are familiar and comfortable with the technology. It provides us with video, voice, and text options in a free and easy-to-use interface that we are all used to,” he said. “The combination of the economy and a shrinking high school cohort has produced a perfect storm for the need for more cost-effective ways to recruit out-of-state and abroad. Skype meets those needs.”

Not everyone agrees that Skype is a suitable alternative to more traditional video conferencing solutions.

Fifty-three percent of school officials said they would buy video technology in the next year.

More than half of education technology officials in K-12 schools and higher-education institutions said they would buy video technology in the next year to make their schools “more effective and efficient” and better prepare students for the workforce, according to a new survey from technology giant Cisco Systems.

The survey results, compiled by Washington, D.C.-based research and polling firm Clarus Research Group, come seven months after Cisco bought Tandberg, a leading video conferencing company. Observers expect Cisco’s purchase—which initially was snubbed by Tandberg stockholders, who balked at the $3 billion bid—to make the company one of the leading video providers in schools and colleges.

While 53 percent of administrators and school technology officials said their institutions “are likely” to buy video equipment sometime in the next year, more than eight in 10 survey respondents said technology plays a role in “improving how students learn,” with 82 percent agreeing that education technology will play a “large role” in “helping prepare students for the workforce of the future.”

The survey asked school and college IT officials to name their top technology issues. “Equipping classrooms with advanced technological equipment” and “using new technologies to help students and faculty work better together”—such as collaborative tools that facilitate online communication, for example—were the two most prominent school technology priorities.

“These results mirror what we have been hearing from education leaders and customers,” said Michael Stevenson, vice president of Cisco’s Global Education group. “They want to invest in new technology, but it must deliver good value and drive cost efficiencies. … Integrating video into the classroom environment can play a key role in improving collaboration, security, and interactive learning.”

“Retaining good students” was the most important “administrative and strategic issue” facing schools, according to the Cisco survey. Other top priorities were improving communication with students’ parents, helping educators use the newest classroom technology, and providing network security.

Cisco polled 600 people from six educational backgrounds, including K-12 administrators and technology decision makers, community college IT officials, and four-year university IT officials and administrators.

Ray Schroeder, director of the University of Illinois Springfield’s Center for Online Learning, Research, and Service, said the video conferencing service at his university costs about half of what it did five years ago, thanks to the expansion of the online video conferencing market.

“You have a lot of competition out there, which has driven the cost down,” he said. “Now, when you take Cisco and Tandberg … they almost have to be more expensive, because of the quality they bring to the marketplace.”

Last October’s Cisco-Tandberg combination attracted campus technology officials looking for a secure online meeting place that provides high-quality close-up shots, document cameras that show details on a page, and multiple camera angles for large-scale, web-based meetings.

Cisco, the world’s largest maker of computer networking equipment, had a cash balance of more than $35 billion at the end of July 2009, most of that overseas. By buying an international company, Cisco avoided the U.S. taxes it would have had to pay to bring the money home.