Videos of Doing and Teaching Math

How can videos help us deepen inquiry into teaching math, and student inquiry into learning math?

I’m slowly finding videos of math teaching and learning on the web, and trying to compile them here. One of these days I may have to graduate from one list into categories, but for now, they’re in the order I discovered them (oldest at the bottom):

• Constance Kamii made some videos of children inventing methods for doing double-digit arithmetic that I am totally enamored with. I LOVE the different routines of putting a simple, “naked numbers” problem on the board and having kids think of answers, recording all the answers, asking for agree/disagree, and then having kids talk through their thinking.
  • There’s a neat video if you scroll down, too, of a kid thinking SO HARD about making change. Here’s the link directly to that video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm4es_VfjC0
• I just discovered the Teaching Channel’s set of video illustrating Common Core Mathematical Practices. Not sure why it took me this long… https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos?page=1&categories=subjects_math,topics_common-core&load=1
• Justin Solnynka made a longer lesson video, that also nicely synopsizes his students’ exploration of permutations.
• Michael Pershan has made a new art form: the 2-minute lesson synopsis video (in this case, a 2-minute synopsis of a 43-minute probability lesson). I can’t wait to add more of these… so time to start making them, everyone!
• A video clip of Jo Boaler modeling an inquiry math lesson in a kind of trippy room in England: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ien-86bXCrI
• Video from classroom teachers, mostly teaching MARS tasks (Mathematics Assessment Resource Service): http://www.insidemathematics.org/index.php/classroom-video-visits/public-lessons. These videos are the result of collaboration between the Noyce Foundation and the Dana Center — high quality stuff!. You might also like seeing how they aligned to the Common Core Mathematical Practices.
• Video from the famous TIMSS comparative study of teaching and learning math in the US and Asia: http://timssvideo.com/.
• Video of students at the Calgary Science School exploring the question, “Can the trees in the Canadian boreal forest be the lungs of the world?” and encountering questions of converting between units, place value, source validity, and more: http://vimeo.com/17659014
  • And much more from the Calgary Science School here: http://calgaryscienceschool.blogspot.com/search/label/math
  • I especially like the idea of using podcasting combined with virtual manipulatives as a form of one-on-one assessment, since we do a lot of that in our online Masters’ and Professional Development and it’s a great way to get to understand someone else’s thinking: http://calgaryscienceschool.blogspot.com/2010/11/more-math-podcasting.htm

• Video of Deborah Ball’s teaching of third graders
  • First, a student argues that six is an even and an odd number, and the class discusses that conjecture: http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/65013 (click the big blue button to watch)
  • Then an example of 3rd grade conjecture and proof: http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/65012
• A series of a teacher working with small groups of middle school(?) students on a cool geometry problem: http://vimeo.com/10774338, http://vimeo.com/10776609
• More from Tom Woodward: an elementary whole-group lesson on counting money: http://vimeo.com/7682473
• An example of Flip video of a student explanation, and then a conversation about using it in the classroom: http://coxmath.blogspot.com/2010/11/video-assessment.html

• More good-teacher-teaching-focused than student-work-focused video: http://www.edutopia.org/math-social-activity-cooperative-learning-video

• Not quite math, but a nice series of videos about inquiry and technology: http://clickbrick.wordpress.com/2010/12/14/wedo-in-action-test-drive-with-a-10-year-old/
• Not just math, but videos from a great New York Times article on what teachers need to be great teachers, especially great math teachers: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/03/07/magazine/20100307-teacher-videos.html?ref=magazine#/calling
• Math Forum Videos!
  • Suzanne goes through a Math Forum Problem-Solving Process with middle-school students in Philadelphia: http://mathforum.org/blogs/suzanne/suzannes-classroom-videos/
  • Max (me) leads Drexel students who are learning to be problem-solving mentors: http://mathforum.org/workshops/dsu/lindynotes.html

And, from my twitter-friend Chuck Poole, a simple Google Doc his students use to assess their own groupwork: http://bit.ly/fa5lAK. The students watch the video of their group working and self-assess.