Tip: Making Videos

Don’t reinvent the wheel. Chunk instruction. Use slides with minimal stuff.

Sep 29, 2020

In spring 2018 my campus had a massive water leak in our main building that pushed many of our classes - including mine - into an online-only format for much of the semester. I started experimenting with videos to supplement in-class work then, and have continued to use videos each semester. Now, of course, many of us are exploring instructional videos to replace class meeting time, either for the whole class or in case of student - or instructor - absence.

(I wish I could say that I’ve planned ahead my courses so that, should I fall ill, I have everything ready to post…but the truth is that I while I do have presentations and activities prepared for each, I create the videos as I go - and they are tailored to each class, so I can’t really re-use last semester’s videos either. A clear design flaw!)

There are many excellent resources to help with the technology aspects, and it’s very easy to fall down a rabbit hole of creativity when planning and recording videos. But for most of us, these are meant to be supplemental to other course activities, so my biggest concern is doing them quickly and well enough to meet my students’ needs, without spending my entire week trying to record and edit professional-looking video. I think it’s important to let go of the idea that these videos compete with what we can find on the internet. Which leads to my first tip…

TIP #1: Don’t reinvent the wheel

There’s so many options for really interesting videos on different topics. Yes, it takes time to curate a list of videos that work for your content areas - but once you have a list of go-to topics, then it’s simple to re-use them.

Khan Academy offers some higher ed focused videos, organized by topic.
Previous posts on math and science content include links to video collections.
OER (Open Education Resource) collections are another option: in Virginia, GoOpenVA is a place to start.
Depending on your textbook (if you have one), the publisher’s website is likely to have supplemental materials as well.
And of course, YouTube.

Sometimes, you really can’t find exactly what you’re looking for, and you’re frustrated by all the almost-but-not-quite-right options. If you decide that it’s simpler to just create it yourself, here are two things I try to keep in mind…

TIP #2: Chunk instruction

I focus on microlectures (short chunks) rather than recording longer videos. This is why I stick with the free version of ScreenPal [revised with new name and link; used to be Screen-Cast-O-Matic]: there’s a 15 minute limit to the video length. I try to plan for 5-8 minutes, since research shows that student attention starts to drop off after 6 minutes, and sharply drops after 9 minutes. It’s not easy to trim down to such a short chunk, but I plan out perhaps 2-3 shorter videos with a student to-do sandwiched in the middle, so students have choices about how much to tackle in one sitting and have the opportunity to immediately implement the content.

TIP #3: Use Slides with Minimal Stuff

Although I do a lot of how-to-find-things-in-the-LMS videos, when I do a more focused lesson I try to keep my slides minimal and use a consistent template. Some of the strategies for an effective presentation are helpful here - just think of presentations you’ve attended where there was so much text on a slide that you couldn’t read it all.

I don’t worry about making visually gorgeous slides with fancy backgrounds and lots of images - as you can see in the example below. I do try to think about students potentially viewing the video from their phones, and if there’s anything that requires more text, I provide a separate link to that outside the video.

It might be personal preference, but I am not a fan of slideshows with animation, memes/cartoons, or embedded videos that are “cute” rather than relevant. So I tend to keep my slides fairly minimal.

Big picture…

What I try to keep in mind is that the goal is to do what is most efficient. Not what is most visually appealing or technologically inspiring, unless video production really is your thing. I have not invested in video editing software (in fact, I never edit my videos and rarely ever do more than one take). When I include my talking head (which I don’t always), I use my laptop’s built-in camera and I did not purchase any special lighting. While any of these investments of time or resources would probably make my videos better, would they make them better enough to justify the use of those resources? Especially when I am one person with limited resources? I’ve decided they would not, but you may choose differently!

If you want to see an example of one of my videos, click on the sandwich…