EDpuzzle

In Shelby County, we are eager to begin a digital conversion of our classrooms. What will our brick-and-mortar schools look like in the future, and in what ways will our students critically interact with media different than the passive modes of the past?

Having just completed reading Michael B. Horn and Heather Staker's excellent book Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools, I certainly have flipped and blended learning on the brain. In a previous entry, I offered a checklist for things to consider when pursuing a flipped classroom.  Today, I want to offer a specific tool that would help with any blended digital environment: EDpuzzle.  This website allows a teacher to grab an online video (or upload their own) and add assessment questions and text information at chosen time-stamped moments in the video.  The teacher creates a class which has a unique code (you can have multiple classes).  Students use the class code when registering in order to get to their assigned videos.  You can use your email, Google, or Edmodo credentials to create your EDpuzzle account. The students' answers will be viewable in a teacher dashboard and you can give them feedback; a report can also be run of your class's submissions.

As a short introduction to what EDpuzzle is and how it works, please watch the following video:

How could you use it?  Even just doing a multiple choice assessment will never be the same after doing a "EDpuzzle video quiz." Of course, open response questions enable students to actively use critical and high-order thinking skills.  In a flipped experience, you could use content videos and questions to pre-assess where the students are in order to better work with them when they come to class.  Oh, and no worries about whether the students watched the video.  You'll know because they answered the questions, and since they can't fast forward the first time they watch it, you know they had to see it at least once in real time.  (For reinforcement, students can rewatch a video after answering questions as many times as they like.)

Downsides?   Since the playing of EDpuzzle videos necessitate headphones or an individual space away from others, an in-class use of the tool will either require 1:1 devices or possibly a lab station rotation model.

Have you used EDpuzzle in your classroom?  What did you think?  Have you used similar tools?  How can you envision using it in your classroom?  Leave your Comments below.