Video Tips

For lessons and in other content, using video is a good choice for reaching students. Creating a video takes a long time to do well. Leave time for filming, editing as well as any necessary re-filiming and re-editing.

Here are some more tips for working with video:

Prior to Filming

  • solidify the course objectives, assessments, and activities
  • create text versions of all lessons

It is smart to wait to film until everything else is done. Fixing video problems takes much longer than fixing textual problems.

During Filming

  • do practice runs and live demos prior to recording
  • record separate feeds of the presenter and any computer material
  • have content creators present to catch issues immediately so that they can be reshot on the spot

Captioning

  • Consider adding captions to your videos to help the hearing impaired and students who are not native speakers of the language used in your videos. See How to create captions and subtitles on YouTube.
  • Remember to apply any editing changes to the captions.

Editing

  • institute a clear edit request process with deadlines for feedback and edits
  • maintain up-to-date documentation of edits requested and completed, including the state of the edits: edited, exported, compressed, uploaded, and other relevant information
  • collect as many edit requests as possible before beginning the editing process and only complete the production cycle (through uploading) when absolutely necessary
  • engage someone committed to reviewing the final videos and uploads to double-check everything

Posting

Once you have created your videos, post them to the Internet to make them available to students.

If you are planning to post videos on YouTube, here are some links for getting started: