Last week, I left my Metadata class feeling totally lost. If being the only undergraduate student in my first graduate class isn’t intimidating enough, we were programming using XSLT-a skill I was just learning for the first time. Fast forward to last night’s class, and I was confidently helping the other students with their XSLT assignments. What happened during the week that drastically changed my level of understanding? I went home and watched YouTube videos on XSLT. I also used to watch videos after class in high school to review for my calculus exams. Watching videos was always helpful in reducing my stress level when I didn’t understand a topic right away. If I had access to a computer in middle or elementary school, math videos definitely would have come in handy when learning long division and subtraction-two areas I struggled in. Â
In AnnMaria’s last blog post, she explains how we’re much more than just a pretty game. Besides our fantastic games, we offer PowerPoints, lesson plans and videos. Our math videos, in particular, are a resource I wish I had access to when I was learning those concepts for the first time. After all, video learning has real benefits for students. Here are just a few of the advantages of video learning.
Students get to learn at their own pace
When you’re feeling confused in class, you can’t freeze time and pause the lecture to give yourself more time to review the concepts. But when you’re watching a video on your own, you most definitely can. Video learning gives students the ability to learn at their own pace, allowing them to pause the video to give themselves more time to review or rewind the video to have a concept explained as many times as they want.
Students get extra hands-on practice
Our math videos are filled with example problems. Practice makes perfect, and our math videos (like the one below on finding the area of the base of a pyramid) give students problems to solve that are similar to ones they will see in class.
Concepts are explained in step-by-step detail
In class, teachers don’t always have time to explain the answers to every problem in step-by-step detail. But since our videos are organized by concept, and often by individual problems, they break down every step so students will have a tool kit to master the particular skill on their own.
Videos can make learning fun
We like to get creative when making our videos. Instead of simply having a teacher speak at students, our videos teach math concepts in fun ways, such as teaching fractions with fishing (below), distributions with bananas and probability with guinea pigs.
Videos enable a flipped classroom
Flipped classrooms involve students learning the lesson at home and then practicing problems in the classroom. Want to flip your classroom? Assign your students one of our instructional videos to watch for homework and then have them practice the concept in class the next day.
Our videos are free and aren’t filled with ads
All of our educational videos are available on our YouTube channel for free. Since I was so impressed by our videos, I asked Maria why they weren’t monetized (monetized YouTube videos allow you to make money off of your videos by displaying advertisements before your content). She said that she wants to keep the videos ad free since our goal is to make high quality content for students and teachers, not just make money. Unlike most learning videos, ours are not only free, but are also not filled with annoying ads.Â
(That said, if you do want to watch an unboxing video – you can check out this one of Maria and Diana opening a package from one of our 7 Generation Games supporters from the U.K.)
Like our YouTube videos? You’ll love our games! Play them today.Â
