Describe and Explain

EDpuzzle was a response to the need for tools to support the flipped classroom, where students preview content at home in order to be ready for more rigorous learning in the classroom. More than just a repository for educational videos, EDpuzzle provides opportunities for educators to create their own guided activities. Rather than choosing from a solely curated list of activities, educators can edit videos to suit their learning outcomes.  Videos can be cropped to highlight specific concepts, multiple choice and short answer questions can be added at strategic points to ensure critical content is emphasized, and student engagement can be controlled by enabling a do-not-skip function that forces students to answer questions, and by offering the chance to rewatch segments. 

Use of EDpuzzle today has expanded to include significantly more uses than its original function as a source for flipped classroom activities. Student participation is encouraged by the visual and interactive nature of the platform. Because educators can modify the activities to address specific student outcomes, the activities can be used as ways to conduct formative assessments, give quizzes, or use as a whole-class learning tool where the teacher and students work through the material together. While EDpuzzle does offer educators the option of creating their own custom video assignments, educators can economize classroom preparation time by choosing pre-made video activities from the EDpuzzle community library, or by choosing content curated video material from EDpuzzle that has been vetted by content experts.  Videos can be imported from YouTube or uploaded from the educator’s computer, which gives educators access to a profusion of videos on any topic. Of course, care  must be taken to preview content to ensure appropriateness and quality. On review, videos from the EDpuzzle community widely vary in effectiveness and rigor. EDpuzzle allows educators to create classroom spaces, where progress on video assignments and grades can be monitored by both teacher and student. According to Sulak-Güzey et al. (2022, p. 52), web tools such as EDpuzzle have “many advantageous functions such as immediate scoring, providing meaningful reporting, and feedback for both learners and instructors.”

In the educator view of this tool, the homepage opens to the discover page, with menus for searching videos in the EDpuzzle community, the school community, or YouTube, as well as by subject or grade level. Additionally, a sidebar provides links for the development of personal content, networking, and online classrooms. Each option yields further drop-down features.  Finally, the button that allows educators to add content to their individual accounts is prominently displayed; choices in the drop down menu include options to discover pre-made content, upload a video, record a video, or to have students create their own EDpuzzle lesson to prove mastery of a topic.  While the website isn’t fancy or particularly appealing visually, the user interface is easy to navigate.

Unlike CrashCourse, which also offers free educational videos, or YouTube, where half of viewers are using the platform for educational purposes, EDpuzzle gives students a chance to respond to and reflect upon ideas in the moment (Berry, 2018). Educational videos often move too quickly for students to take notes as they go; EDpuzzle allows the educator to chunk the material appropriately so students can digest the material in shorter pieces. As mentioned, the platform prevents students from skipping ahead, and allows them to rewatch video segments in case they miss something the first time around. Over time, good listening habits can be nurtured. EDpuzzle also has a live version, where the educator controls the pace during a whole-class activity, which provides opportunities for class discussions of important content to ensure deeper understanding. 

Explore and Connect

Digital technology has the reputation for being available “any time, any place, any pace (Selwyn, 2014, p. 133).” However, the fact remains that students still show up in classrooms everyday, and teachers are expected to teach them. Selwyn (2014, p. 161) describes popular literature surrounding educational technology as showing “disdain for formal education, a default assumption that education is best organized along informal lines of discover, play and hard fun.”  This attitude has become prevalent with students as well, who come to class with the expectation that learning should always be easy, fun, and entertaining. EDpuzzle helps address these expectations by combining what students would view as boring learning with watching video. Removing the lecture from the front of the room and putting in on the screen creates an access point that students are willing to enter. This is especially true of my tenth grade English students. The class is small (12 students), predominantly male (8 boys, 4 girls), and have been together every day, in every class, since kindergarten. In the midst of constant sibling-like rivalries and taunts, grabbing their interest and maintaining their focus is a constant challenge. EDpuzzle is one application that helps direct their focus by chunking difficult content in manageable pieces, and, when used in the live, instructor-led mode (which they prefer), provides opportunities for clarifying questions and in-the-moment class discussions.

An instructional task that could be facilitated by the EDpuzzle platform is the comparison of different ethical approaches to making decisions. CrashCourse videos, narrated by Hank Green, are information dense, and explain difficult, hard-to-teach concepts in approachable ways. CrashCourse videos are student favorites because Hank Green is personable, energetic, and entertaining, and because humor and silliness is embedded in videos that address rigorous content. However, the density of the information provided and the speed at which content is delivered (Hank Green talks fast) in these videos would require students to either watch the videos in their entirety two or three times while they take copious notes, or to guess at what elements of the information-rich presentation is most important.  By using the EDpuzzle platform to present CrashCourse videos, educators can chunk the content appropriately, and draw attention to essential learning points. Combined with Cornell notes, these interactive video lessons provide students with the vocabulary, phrasing, real life examples, and questions they need to to be able to discuss complex philosophical topics with confidence.  Once all desired philosophical approaches are viewed and discussed, students should be able to analyze their own decision-making style. Perhaps the end product would be a self-recorded video explaining their ethical stance and providing examples of authentic dilemmas where they have applied the decision making process.

EDpuzzle developers describe the platform as a way to ensure student engagement. They cite statistics that 65% of learners are visual learners, and 95% of students watch YouTube regularly. Therefore, they surmise that videos can be a powerful learning tool, especially when there is a way to track engagement and interaction–a problem solved by the platform they created. Turning the tables from educator-led to student-centered, EDpuzzle can be used as a cooperative learning activity to engage students in the exploration of content. Imagine assigning student groups with different subtopics related to an important concept. In teams, students search YouTube to find a video that teaches their subtopic well. The search requires students to be on the lookout for bias and false information, and exposes them to the language of the topic each time they view a video for consideration. Content is reinforced once again when they add questions to a chosen video, and again when they create an answer key. Finally, picture the groups presenting the interactive videos in live mode to the class–this reinforces what they have learned and allows the rest of the class to learn from their work.

Connect and Critique

Selwyn (2014, p.141) asserts that

“In addition to these concerns, it could be argued that digital education is characterized by a number of subtle changes at the level of social relations. For example, personal values of time, duty of care, scholarship or family might be said to count for little within models of digital education that are based on speed, replicability and temporality.”

Later, Selwyn cites Brighouse (2003, p. 3)

“[People], however diverse, learn best when they learn together, sharing each other’s insight and experience, absorbing knowledge and recreating knowledge as they collaborate, in the company of their teachers in a common pursuit.”

Platforms such as EDpuzzle have the potential to isolate students and contribute to an environment where relationships are downplayed in favor of systematic teaching, which can contribute to neglect of the collaborative and relational aspects of knowing and learning. Garrison et al., (2000) suggest that meaningful online learning  experiences occur when social, cognitive, and teaching presence are all assured. Assigning EDpuzzle as a stand-alone task where students answer the questions independently falls short on all three counts. However, when EDpuzzle is used to spur whole-class discussion, when students are permitted to work together to answer questions or to create EDpuzzle assignments of their own, and when connections are made clear through the use of graphic organizers as note-catchers for important concepts, then the platform has the capacity to establish a true community of inquiry, and honor and promote social aspects of education in order to counter the lack thereof described by both Selwyn (2014) and Brighouse (2003).

Selwyn (2014) also describes EdTech as value-laden, with some people benefitting more than others in terms of power and profit. As with much of EdTech today, EDpuzzle has come up with a way to monetize its offerings. The free version of EDpuzzle limits the number of videos an educator can store on their site to twenty, but allows unlimited storage and access for a monthly fee. If an educator uses EDpuzzle once a week, the free version does not offer enough storage space to house videos for an entire year. However, there are workarounds. If the educator has created  the EDpuzzle video, or edited one found on the site, the new version can be found by searching with the educator’s network even if the video assignment  has to be deleted from the account to make room for more. It is this resourceful capacity to “find a way” that enables educators to avoid falling into the money pit that EdTech has the potential to become. Teacher resourcefulness in terms of creative use of free EdTech makes it possible to remove  gatekeeping from the hands of administrators, curriculum leaders, or technology personnel, and allows teachers to use the EdTech they know best meets the pedagogical and learning needs of their students.

One of Selwyn’s most consistent observations is that EdTech has the potential to exploit its users. He compares EdTech to the ‘social factory,’ where work expands beyond the normal place and time into the home and the community in a breakdown of the delineation of formal and informal labor (Selwyn, 2014, p. 133). In other words, since an educator can do more, they often will do more. Of course, educators have always taken their work home. However, EdTech has taken “beyond the workday” to new levels as educators feel compelled to integrate new technologies into their lessons. For creative personalities, the rabbit hole of time-sinks for going above and beyond in the modification and use of EdTech tools for their classroom use are multitudinous. What is needed is a different mindset for integration of technology, not only in terms of the classroom setting, but also in terms of the operational and data-driven aspects of school culture. Ethical decisions should be part of this new paradigm, not only in addressing issues such as the ‘digital divide,’ but also for issues related to the exploitation of educators and data-driven decisions made for all students based on the needs of a few.

References

About Edpuzzle. (2023). Edpuzzle. Retrieved February 23, 2023, from https://edpuzzle.com/about

Berry, S. (2018, November 8). Study shows half of YouTube viewers are there for education. Videomaker. Retrieved February 23, 2023, from https://www.videomaker.com/study-shows-half-of-youtube-users-are-there-for-education/

Brighouse, T. (2003). Comprehensive schools then, now and in the future: Is it time to draw a line in the sand and create a new ideal? FORUM, 45(1), 3-11.

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2  -3), 87-105.

Selwyn, N. (2014). Distrusting Educational Technology: Critical Questions for Changing Times. Routledge.

Sulak-Güzey, S., Akdoğdu, E., Demi̇r, M.C., & Aksu-Dünya, B. (2022). Impact of EDpuzzle use on the assessment and measurement course achievement. Hayef: Journal of Education, \ 19(1), 52–60.