Teaching Duet Pedagogy

Students working on the "The Broken Stick Problem" in Lahore, Pakistan.

The BLOSSOMS video modules are not intended to replace an existing curriculum but rather to enhance the teaching of certain lessons by the lively video presence of a gifted “guest teacher". Each video is designed for viewing in brief segments, allowing the in-class teacher between segments to engage the class in an active, goal-oriented exercise. Students in the classroom setting would watch a segment of a BLOSSOMS video, no segment lasting longer than about 5 minutes. Then after each segment, the in-class teacher would guide or facilitate the students through an active learning exercise building from the video segment and provided by the guest lecturer. After the learning objective is accomplished, the video is turned on again for another short segment. This iterative process continues until the exercise is over, usually lasting a full class session.

To see an MIT BLOSSOMS video used in a classroom, watch the Statistics class of John Bookston at Arlington High School in Arlington, MA.