Benefits

When students receive the feedback, they can listen, pause, replay and revise according to the teacher's response as often as needed (Cavaleri et al., 2019; Bissell, 2017; Grigoryan, 2017).  Spoken language tends to repeat or recycle information as well, which can be beneficial to students in reiterating and reinforcing key points in the feedback (Cavaleri et al., 2019).  The anytime, anywhere, as often as needed affordances that videos naturally provide is beneficial to students with attention deficit disorders and cognitive processing issues as well as those struggling with the task or just needing reinforcement.  

In presenting a screencast, teachers engage students in a conversation about their progress, identifying areas of both strengths and weaknesses, rather than just addressing minor syntax errors, providing more depth in content for students to consider, and thus engaging higher-order thinking skills (Mahoney et al., 2018). 

When given feedback on a targeted area, students can more easily understand teacher direction, correct errors and be motivated to make manageable change (Fang and Wickersham-Fish, 2021; Cavaleri et al., 2019).  Computer mediated communication (CMC), such as screencasting feedback, is a strategy teachers can routinely employ that provides guidance and actionable steps for students to reach their true potential (Shabani et al., 2010).

Screencasting provides advantages that could surpass oral or written methods in the ability to target areas of concern, convey teacher meaning through voice intonation, as well as expression, and provide increased comprehension of the feedback (Cunningham, 2019; Ali, 2016).

Screencasting feedback allows teachers and students to further develop their relationship through personalized learning and can be more supportive than traditional methods (Bissell, 2017; Fang & Wickersham-Fish, 2021).  

Feedback provided through screencast can be more personal and customized to the learner’s experience which is supportive for all students (Bissell, 2017; Henderson & Phillips, 2015).  79% of participants surveyed stated that video feedback was more personal in nature (Matthews, 2019).

Video feedback addresses the need for students to have face-to-face communication, aiding distance instruction such as an online course or to provide 1:1 support with students when doing so in the classroom environment just isn’t possible (Anson et. al, 2016). 

In combining both audio and visual modalities, screencasts can reduce cognitive load as well, which allows for more working memory to both process new information and to integrate it into long-term memory (Fang & Wickersham-Fish, 2021; Moreno & Mayer, 2002 as cited in Grigoryan, 2017).