Genius Hour

Genius Hour

What exactly is genius hour, and why are so many educators adopting this practice in their classrooms? Check out the videos and other resources below. They explain what genius hour is, how it works, and provide many useful examples of student projects from the classroom. 

 

Image taken from Learning and laughing with Room 222 Blog (Mrsbrightsclass.blogspot.ca)

List of Videos to use with genius hour in the classroom

This document can be found at http://tinyurl.com/GHVideos.

Curated by Joy Kirr (@JoyKirr).

Creativity:

15-Year-Old Kelvin Doe Wows M.I.T. - 10:06

Caine’s Arcade - 10:58

Caine’s Arcade - From Movie to a Movement - 8:20 (Cardboard Challenge)

Creativity Requires Time - 2:06

Dot. The World’s Smallest Stop-Motion Video - 1:37

Dot. The Making of. - 5:36

Ellen’s Kid Inventors - 5:51

The Gap by Ira Glass - 2:18

Gulp. The World’s Largest Stop-Motion Set... - 1:45

Gulp. The Making of. - 5:45

The Missing Chapter: Our distorted view of success… - 5:49

Obvious to You, Amazing to Others - 1:54

Thomas Suarez, 12-Year-Old App Developer - 4:40

When there is a correct answer - Exercise in Creative Thinking - 2:00

Motivation:

Apple Steve Jobs: The Crazy Ones - 1:01

For the Heroes: A Pep talk from Kid President - 4:00

Just 1 Girl - 2:52

Kid President’s Pep Talk - 3:27

Moonshot Thinking - 3:45

Sarah McLachlan - World On Fire - 4:20

The Pale Blue Dot - 3:45

There Are Reasons to Believe in a Better World (Ad) - 1:30

The Time You Have in Jelly Beans - 2:44

What Do You Love? - 3:40

You Are Limitless - 2:43

TRY:

Aubri’s Rube Goldberg Monster Trap - 4:06

Blind Skateboarder. Be Brave. Be safe. - 3:18
Girl’s First Ski Jump - 1:49

How Many Times Should You Try Before Success? - 1:55

Matt Cutts - Try Something New for 30 Days - 3:24
Ruby Reaches for a Toy - 3:19

TMB PanYee FC Short Film - 5:14

Explaining Genius Hour:

20% Projects 2013 - 2:06

2013 Genius Hour Reflections - 5:39

2014 #20Time Projects in 4 minutes - Kevin Brookhouser - 3:49

2014 Genius Hour Projects in 3.5 minutes - Joy Kirr - 3:23

20Time Projects - Karl Lindgren-Streicher - 3:20

Genius Hour - SEJH Library - 1:05

Genius Hour - Follow Your Passion - Denise Krebs - 2:33

Genius Hour in Rm 111 - 1:24

Intro to P-Day for Kids - Paul Blogush - 4:05

What IS Genius Hour? - Chris Kesler - 3:09

What is Genius Hour? - Gallit Zvi - 2:56

For teachers - Encouragement / reasons to try Genius Hour:

Born to Learn - 4:55

Brandon Busteed of Gallop - Student Engagement - 32:57

Cameron Herold - Let’s Raise Kids to Be Entrepreneurs - 19:32

Design Thinking brought to life - 4:20

Don’t Call It a Classroom: Kevin Brookhouser at TEDxMonterey - 16:06

Extracurricular Empowerment: Scott McLeod at TEXxDesMoines - 8:19

Failing Superman - 13:23

Focus Show Dan Pink Interview - 19:34

Making and Constructionism - 1:02:03

Messy Play: The Benefits - 1:14

Passion Based Learning with Angela Maiers - 25:21

The Power of Passion - Richard St. John - 6:54

The Power to Question - Tiffany Poirier at TEDxVictoria2013 - 16:50

Rethinking Learning: The 21st Century Learner - 4:00

Sir Ken Robinson - Do schools kill creativity? - 20:03

We Are Makers - 16:59

Where Good Ideas Come From (with lesson) - 4:07

Livebinder

Amazing livebinder from @joykirr about genius hour can be found at

Genius Hour

Articles and resources

Carter, N. (2014, August 4). Genius hour and the 6 essentials of personalized education [weblog post]. Edutopia. Retrieved from: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/genius-hour-essentials-personalized-education-nichole-carter

Genius Hour: http://www.geniushour.com/

Genius hour Wiki: http://geniushour.wikispaces.com/

Juliani, A.J. (2013, June 25). Why "20% time" is good for schools [weblog post]. Edudemic. Retrieved from: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/20-percent-time-a-j-juliani

Learning and laughing with Room 222. (2014, February 8). Genius hour: Round 1. Retrieved from: http://mrsbrightsclass.blogspot.ca/2014/02/genius-hour-round-1-hours-2-and-3.html

Solarz, P. (2013, November). Here are my genius hour resources [weblog post]. Retrieved from http://psolarz.weebly.com/2013-2014-passion-projects.html

Thinking and Linking. Genius hour planning sheet [pdf]. Retrieved from http://thinkingandlinking.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/for-my-genius-hour-project-i-will-be-working-with.pdf

Genius hour guidelines rubric https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m9cWyMw2eInHEArQMpkCV_MTlEeHRIZNMDi7jQtmreY/mobilebasic?pli=1

References:

Chris Kesler. (2013, September 6). What is genius hour?- An introduction to genius hour in the classroom [Video file]. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMFQUtHsWhc