Kids+Teaching+Kids-+Screencasting

Empowering Students!
It's no secret that a lot of kids have a hard time learning math. Maybe they have a hard time with the language or just picturing how math works. Most of us know that one way to learn a subject well is to teach it.

One California middle school teacher, Eric Marcos is taking a novel approach and allowing his students to produce instructional videos.When Marcos decided to do the project, he had never made a screencast himself. Using a tablet PC, a simple paint program, a microphon, and Camtasia Studio, he learned how to make screencasts ( or mathcasts as he calls them) along side his students. For teachers who can't afford Camtasia, the free version Jing is an alternative.

Often his students pick math problems to create screencasts for that they and other have difficulty with. By working out the solutions and making the videos, his students report that they really learn to understand the problems, and of course their classmates learn from the videos too. The screencasts are posted on MathTrain so students from around the world can view them. One of the most popular screencasts ( see below) is less than a minute and has been viewed over 8000 times.

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While creating screencasts, students take charge of their learning, and they collaborate to create artifacts that will help students globally into the future. This is one way to make math fun and engaging.

Assignments like this really empower students!

Read more about Marcos and his MathCasts at How Kids Teach Kids about Math


 * Next up, see Student Educational Portfolio **