Week 9 Student Thoughts: Student-Created Videos

My Math Analysis Honors students began creating their own videos over the last week or so.  They would receive the instruction and in-class practice just like my "normal" flipped classroom, but throughout the course of the week they were required to make three videos for Unit Q.  Here are their thoughts after the whole Unit.  

See samples and other posts on Student-Created Content here.

Question to my Math Analysis students:
Tell me how you feel about the videos (you making the videos with a partner). Did you like them? Not like them (give reasons either way!). Did they help you learn in any way? Were they fun? What was the best part of them? What was the worst part of them? Please explain your answers as much as possible.

At first, students were very hesitant and not that excited about creating the videos.  However, I think these responses speak VOLUMES about the value of having students create their own content.  If I had to list out my purpose and goals for why I am having my students do this, it could be summarized in the words straight from my students' mouths below.  Amazing.  They get it.

• I really liked making the videos with my partner. I felt that not only did it help me learn and understand, but i helped someone else understand the problem as well. It helped me learn because there is a difference between being able to do a problem and explaining it, and if you can explain it then you learn the best. I think the worst part was that sometimes in the videos you can hear the other people talking.
• Watching and making the videos did help a lot because first of all we all have a different ways to explain how to do certain problems. Many have their own way of explaining and for example when i did the video with my partner i understood the problem better because we both had our own ways of solving it.
• I felt that doing the videos with a partner was beneficial because if I didn't get one part, they would explain it to me and this would help me. I did like the videos but the thing is that I really don't like listening to my own voice. Yes, the videos did help me learn because when I was stuck on the problems in the SSS for the PQs/PTs, I would refer to the videos. I think the best part of them was having someone walk me through the problems. The worst part of them would be that it was kind of sloppy on the iPad.
• I loved the videos!  They were very fun and we got to go through our classmates' videos instead of having to make Mrs. Kirch make all of the videos by herself.  I liked the videos a lot more than quizzes for this part; quizzes would have been stressful.  The "worst" part wasn't all that bad.  It took a lot of time to get our partner(s) together or to get electronics to work.  For example, my partner and I took awhile trying to get the iPad to take a picture of our work, but it was worthwhile.
• I actually liked making the videos. I felt that it was good review, and we also got to see how it is to be on the other side of the screen. I think I actually prefer videos than the quiz. The videos worked really well for this unit since there were a lot of proofs and such things, so it was not so complicated trying to explain it and working it out on video. 
• I liked making the videos because it helped me understand the problem we had to 'teach'. By doing the videos, I completely had to understand the problem to be able to explain it on the video. Understanding the problem was like teaching it to yourself and it was really helpful to do that especially with help from classmates. The best part of the videos was doing it with a partner and understanding the different ways you could do it (for example, your partner might have a different way than you). The worst part, for me, was explaining the problem because it's always hard for me to explain things even though I may completely understand it in my head.
• Well at first I didn’t like them because I'm not very a techie but it wasn’t so bad. The main thing we must do is stay on top of it b/c if you wait for the last minute then you & your partner can't really work together. Since it was our first time it was a bit messy but I'm sure if we practice more we will get better at it. The best part of them was using you iPad that was fun ha. But it was very useful when trying to solve the answers to some we didn’t understand.