Ted-Ed Site

 

We all love to watch TED talks because they can be so inspiring and provide us with information we want but did you know that TED talks has a site that is for educators, parents, and students?  I didn't until the other day.  They have a whole set of topics which all follow the same plan but are of so many different topics.  

I didn't know about the site until I followed a link for something and there it was.  It was easy to sign up for as an educator.  Once in, I looked for math lessons and came up with such a variety.  I like that they allow you to look for specific strands such as Algebra, data and probability, geometry, measurement or numbers and operations.

Some of the titles for Algebra have some interesting titles such as "How folding paper can get you to the moon" or "Gridiron physics: scalers and vectors", or "Accuracy vs Precision".  The last one I could have used in my trades math class to help students understand the difference.  Under data and probability, you'll find activities like "The monster duel riddle", or "How to spot a misleading graph?", or "Why do airlines sell too many tickets?".  

If you check geometry, you'll find topics like "The art of folding origami", or "Can you solve the honeybee riddle?", or "football physics".  Then in measurement you'll see "Which voting system is best?", or "Why don't perpetual machines ever work?", or "How to visualize one part per million".  Finally under numbers and operations there are topics such as "The race to make quantum computers work" or "Where do math symbols come from?" or "How does your smartphone know your location?".  Note that many of these videos show up in more than one group so could be used in different ways.

All lessons are set up in the same way.  The lessons begin with a short 4 to 5 minute videos. The videos can be watched together in the room or can be watched individually depending on your situation.  The next step referred to as the Think stage involves a set of about 8 multiple choice questions based on the video just watched.  This is followed by a dig deeper section where students receive additional information on the topic.  The finally part is the discuss with one open ended questions and a guided question for the class to do.  In addition each one has the option to customize as needed.

Furthermore, TED-ed offers a variety of collections revolving around specific topics including calculating distance , exploring other dimensions, the math of online dating, fractals, and so many other topics.  Again, these are set up with the watch, think, dig deeper, and discuss in the same way the individual lessons are set up. 

TED-ed also offers teachers the opportunity to create their own lessons beginning with a video from Youtube or other place.  Once the video is located, you are asked to create an introduction to go with the video before moving on to creating multiple choice questions or open ended questions to go with the video.  Dig deeper asks for additional information on the topic and a finally discussion question for students to answer.  It allows teachers to add a final concluding comment to wrap up the whole lesson.

The information on having students get an account and assigning lessons is found under the help page.  You have to do a search to find the information but once it is found the information is quite clear.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear. Have a great day.