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Our Founding and Mission

George Forman, Ellen Hall, and Deborah Dumont conceived the idea of Videatives in July, 2003.  Deborah’s belief in the viability of our business plan encouraged us, and we became incorporated later that year. Deborah's experience as an educator, and in starting and leading education companies, helped move Videatives from idea to reality. By 2005, Videatives was well established, and Deborah's new work assignment required that she resign from the company. George and Ellen continued to run Videatives until 2018, when the company was purchased by the Boulder, Colorado based Boulder Journey School. Videatives is currently managed by Ellen’s son, Sam Hall, who is also the CEO of Boulder Journey School. 

Videatives continues to implement its mission to make children's thinking visible through the use of short video clips with supporting text.  This format (video plus text) has great potential to map theory to practice and to generate theory from practice.   It is our belief that good teaching results from helping children explicate their current theories rather than from directly teaching a new theory.  As our knowledge of children's intelligence grows, so does our ability to support the children's reflections on their thinking, their understandings and misconceptions about the social and physical world around them.  Videative titles capture the details of what children know and how teachers can build from children's knowledge. 

Sam Hall, President

Sam Hall is the president of Videatives, Inc. and the CEO of Boulder Journey School. Sam has over 20 years of experience in the field of early childhood education. Sam has spent much of his career focussed on helping children, teachers, and graduate students discover and develop innovative uses of technology in a school setting, and has also been involved in the management and development of several companies and initiatives. At Videatives, Sam is responsible for managing the day-to-day operations of the company. Sam is a board member of Hawkins Centers of Learning, and a member of the Headstarter Network Education Council. Sam is also a member of the World Forum Foundation’s Working Group on Children’s Rights and is a producer of the Voices of Children Documentary developed in partnership with the Working Group on Children’s Rights. Sam has presented at conferences and provided consulting services for several schools and organizations both locally and worldwide.