CrashCourse - Using Videos to Make Learning More Fun

Research has shown that more than 65% of students are visual learners. Meaning most of our students need to see what they are learning to retain it. I'd like to introduce you to CrashCourse.

CrashCourse is a Youtube channel for students, adults, educators, and parents. The channel's goal is to help people learn new things, know things, and gain a deeper understanding of themselves and the world around them. There is a second channel called CrashCourseKids for Primary learners. They also have helpful infographics for subjects - these are great tools to hang up in your classroom.

These videos can help students prepare for a test, help teachers brush up on a subject or even use them during their lesson plan. The channel covers chemistry, literature, psychology, history and so on. The videos are less than 15 minutes and are student-friendly.

CrashCourse even has a user-friendly website for all educators. You can visit their site here: https://thecrashcourse.com/about/. The website has a "courses" tab where you can find an abundance of subjects to choose from. Once you have chosen your subject, you will be brought to a page with all the videos that are relevant to your subject area.

Using videos as visual aids help students stay engaged in a lesson, helps with digital literacy, and students can review the video later if they need a refresher.

Insert video: https://youtu.be/owHF9iLyxic

Here is an example from CrashCourseKids, "What's an Engineer?".The video uses visual aids, probing questions and relating the subject to the community - creating an excellent resource for students. CrashCourse gives primary students a visually stimulating introduction to what an engineer is. This is a great way to begin a lesson on engineering, this allows students to get excited about the subject and get a better understanding of the lesson at hand. As an educator you can even use the video in parts, you can pause at every question and work through the problem as a class, and have your students solve the question themselves before continuing the video - making the lesson interactive.

Do you think using visual aids is helpful to students? Will you be trying out CrashCourse?

Brought to you by Victoria OTECC - Niagara University