This is a guest post from Ruston Hurley, the founder of Next Vista for Learning.

Imagine that your students are thinking of ways to explain challenging concepts to their peers or younger students. Can they put “Think of it this way…” into short videos that would help others for years to come?

Getting an idea for making such pieces is a lot easier if your students have watched a variety of videos made with exactly that aim in mind. But where do you find such videos?

Next Vista for Learning’s 90-second video contests are designed to highlight clear and creative approaches to learning something one might encounter in school. Here are three finalists from recent contests:

Symbolism in Shakespeare: Ophelia’s Flowers

Pi Day

Mummification

Once students understand that a video could be built many ways – stop motion, narrated art, footage from phones, etc. – they can become more creative about what they put together for your class.

Next Vista’s fall contest finished in December, and if you would like to help choose the winners (and see a nice variety of short videos, too), send an email to info@nextvista.org (with “contest judging” in the subject line), and they’ll get info to you on how to take part.

Share the videos with your students, and they can get a sense of what others do to explain challenging concepts in a concise video.