TED launches initiative to bring ‘lessons worth sharing’ to high schoolers

TED, the organisation behind the popular conference series with the same name, launched a new initiative that aims to bring TED-like video content to high school students. The idea here is to repackage existing TED talks as well as videotaped lessons from teachers around the world with additional graphics and effects to make them more palatable to a younger audience.

As TED’s curator Chris Anderson notes, the organisation doesn’t claim that TED-Ed, as this new program is called, will “transform education.” Instead, he says, the organisation wants to help teachers by making these videos available, but also by providing a platform for the best teachers to showcase their skills.

TED has also hired a team of animators to help teachers turn their best lessons into “memorable videos.” The organization plans to release about 300 videos within the next year. Anybody can suggest teachers or already existing video lessons that should be included in this programme.

Not trying to reproduce the Khan Academy

Anderson specifically points out that his mission is not to “recreate what Salman Khan of the Khan Academy and many others are doing so brilliantly, namely to meticulously build up entire curricula on video.” Instead, he wants these short videos to “spark curiosity” and allow teachers to build on top of this.

Here is an example of one of the new TED-ed lessons: