Video Interactions for Teaching and Learning (VITAL) Study

The Columbia Center for New Media Teaching and Learning (CCNMTL) and developmental psychologist Herbert Ginsburg have collaborated on a project that uses video to help teachers look clinically at their early childhood students’ individual learning needs, particularly in mathematics. Through the project, Video Interactions for Teaching and Learning (VITAL), CCNMTL and Dr. Ginsburg have created a Web-based application that enables student-teachers to view a digital video library of observations and clinical interviews and to construct multimedia essays incorporating references to texts and videos. Student-teachers can incorporate their observational analyses of videotaped interviews and interactions with young children into their course papers. The goal of the project is to help new teachers develop the skills needed to conduct clinical interviews and make diagnostic assessments of individual learner’s needs. The National Science Foundation has funded a study, conducted by CCT, to see whether or not the use of this rich multimedia environment improves the teaching of early mathematics and can be applied to other university settings.