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By using Teachem to deliver instructional video content, you can free up classroom time for more personalized learning.
Teachem [2] is a free online web site that where you can easily turn YouTube videos into online classes that can be private or public. A variety of additional teaching and learning aids, such as Flash Cards and ‘SmartNotes’ round out the functionality to deliver a uniquely powerful tool for delivering flipped course content. Originally modeled off of their sister website focused on legal education, Lawline.com, the parent company started Teachem to provide this great, free functionality to teachers of all subjects.
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Teachem started off with limited functionality to keep it simple and easy to adopt (in contrast to ed.ted.com, for example, with some wonderful functionality available, but rather buggy performance in my experience). They are gradually, thoughtfully, building in additional functionality (more on that below). For example, a section called “Create an Exam” is slated for release this month.
This brief video provides a quick introduction to the application:
Features & Functionality
Here are some of the things you can do with this simple yet powerful application:
- Use your own videos or tap into the hundreds of thousands already available on YouTube: Use videos that you’ve created and uploaded to YouTube, or use any of the endless variety of YouTube videos available, but deliver them in a controlled environment.
- Keep them private or make them open: Provide access only to students with your school’s email address, or leave the course publicly accessible, “MOOC” style.
- Organize: Easily create a separate ‘school’ for each subject, course, instructor, etc. The possibilities are endless. Organize video content into categories for easy access.
- Create Flashcards & ‘Smartnotes’: This video [4] discusses how to create and email Flashcards and ‘SmartNotes’, linkable directly to the point that they appear in the class.
- Cost to you: Free, Zip, Nada!
A good way to get a feel for Teachem is to check out a few example ‘schools’ and courses created using Teachem:
History of the World Since 1500 [5] - This course presents and critiques a narrative world history from the year 1500 forward using multiple videos.
Teachem FAQ Classes [6] - Teachem uses its own tool set to create a ‘school’ that provides instruction on how to use their application.
Demo University [7] - This is an example if a ‘school’ with a variety of different subjects and classes added. Teachers could easily add flashcards to any class and take SmartNotes that are time stamped to the video.
Philosophy Class 101 [8] (locked) - This example serves to illustrate how a private course looks to someone who hasn’t been invited.
New Features Recently Added or Coming Soon
Teachem has been gradually adding functionality to their application. Here’s a few features recently added or slated for delivery very soon:
- Enrolled students: A dashboard to see who is enrolled in your school(s).
- Sharing links to flashcards: Right now you can only share your class link. With this new feature you will be able to share a link to any flashcard within the class.
- Unlisted classes: Now that public classes automatically get added to our public catalog we will give you the option to create a public class but keep it unlisted.
- Features in the works for delivery a little further out in the future include the ability to add additional teacher roles to your school, a central location where you can access all your flashcards and SmartNotes, and Exams.
Ultimately, Teachem is as about learner, with functionality designed to deliver an engaging learning experience and content that can be rewound and replayed as needed. With content flipped like this, valuable class time is freed up to provide more constructive, hands-on, and personalized learning, which is the ultimate goal of the flipped classroom.
Related Posts (if the above topic is of interest, you might want to check these out):
8 Great Reasons to Flip Your Classroom (and 4 of the Wrong Reasons), from Bergmann and Sams
The Flipped Classroom is Hot, Hot, Hot
Is Reverse Instruction Education Technology’s Perfect Storm?
Related Posts
[9]Flipping the iPad Enabled Classrom (Part 2 of 2) [9]
[10]Reverse Instruction Tools And Techniques (Part 3) - Using Existing Web Based Educational Content [10]- [11]Flipping the iPad Enabled Classroom (Part 1 of 2) [11]
- [12]5 Ways to Share YouTube Videos Safely and Privately (Without the Distractions) [12]
About Kelly Walsh [13]
Kelly Walsh is Chief Information Officer at The College of Westchester, in White Plains, NY, where he also teaches. In 2009, Walsh founded EmergingEdTech.com. As an education and instructional technology advocate, he frequently delivers presentations on a variety of related topics at schools and conferences across the U.S. Walsh is also an author, and online educator, regularly running Flipped Class Workshops [14] online. His eBook, the Flipped Classroom Workshop-in-a-Book is available here [15]. Kelly also writes, records, and performs original music ... stop by kwalshmusic.com [16] and have a listen!
[Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are my own, or those of other writers, and not those of my employer. - K. Walsh]