H5P: A Little Tool That Made Me Rethink Teaching

 

In graduate school classrooms, sometimes you are not just learning knowledge, but also being bombarded by certain tools - such as the magical tools I recently encountered in ICT (Information and Communication Technology) and Material Design courses: H5P.

H5P？ At first glance, I thought it was some kind of vitamin supplement or a 5G upgraded version. I didn't realize until the teacher opened a presentation page, clicked the mouse a few times, a question box popped up in the video, tags appeared on the image, and the quiz was directly embedded in the slide “Wait a sec… is this the mythical ‘interactive teaching super tool’ I’ve been waiting for?”

Before this week's ICT class, we were encouraged to personally experience creating H5P content in the Material Design class. So, I carefully clicked, dragged, copied, and pasted to create my first Course Presentation. Although the content was very basic and the page was very simple, at that moment I felt a little proud:

“So… this is what it feels like to make clickable, interactive content? I did that?!”

For me, a traditional teacher who is not particularly skilled in technology, this visual, zero code, and free (highlight!) tool is simply a blessing. Not to mention, it can seamlessly integrate with platforms such as Moodle. Teachers only need to upload links, and students can learn immediately without even flipping through paper!

The Flipped Classroom Revelation

In addition to what I learned in ICT class, I also learned about Professor Miriam's exquisite flipped classroom made with H5P in Material Design class, which gave me a lot of inspiration. Flipped classroom refers to students watching embedded videos before class, with multiple-choice questions, matching exercises, and even small discussion prompts along the way; In class, everyone had in-depth discussions based on their existing knowledge, which improved efficiency by more than a little bit.

This also made me start thinking seriously: if I have the opportunity to stand on the podium again in the future, can I also use H5P to do similar teaching designs? I hope to encourage students to no longer passively receive information, but to actively learn and practice in the courseware like playing a puzzle game.

My Reflection: H5P Isn’t Just a Tool, It’s a Pedagogical Mindset

Of course, H5P is not a universal key. It cannot replace the teacher's teaching goal design, content screening, and judgment of students' needs. But it does provide us with a more vivid, interesting, and highly engaging teaching method.

More importantly, it reminds me that teaching should not just be 'giving', but should be 'guiding'. Designing tasks, setting thinking points, and guiding students to explore using H5P are all difficult but particularly important parts of traditional teaching.