Points to remember

You already know that remote teaching is more challenging than the usual classroom lectures. These points should be helpful while creating a video for instructional purposes.

  • Content

    • Keep it short: The attention span for an online video has been observed to be 7 mins, we should keep the duration of the video to be at most 15 mins.

    • One concept per video: If the video is longer, break it up. A good rule of thumb is to have one concept/idea per video (as opposed to a topic in the classroom).

    • Give references: You should provide links or clear references to the material talked about in the video. It can be course notes, another paper or a book.

  • Engagement

    • Ask questions: A small pause for a question really helps students to get their focus back. Few ways to incorporate questions are mentioned on this webpage.

    • Give assignments and feedback: Unfortunately, videos are only a one way communication, aid them with regular assignments and feedback to be effective.

    • Continuous evaluation: Use frequent pop quizzes to keep track of performance of students. Some tools to make quizzes are discussed here.

  • Accessibility

    • Upload on Youtube: You can share the videos over YouTube (directions). It can stream even under poor connection by adjusting the resolution.

    • Use external microphone: An external microphone gives much less ambient noise as compared to the inbuilt one in laptops. Most of the headphones have an external mic.

    • Use a learning management system: You can better organize the video links using a software/website such as mooKIT. If youtube is not an option, you can directly upload the video on such websites. Google sites provides you an easy way to make a website. You can incorporate documents, videos, quizzes seamlessly in such a site.

    • Don't send resources with emails: It is not a good idea to share video/pdf files as email attachements (can't update, hard to access), instead use Google drive or One drive.

    • Make them accessible to differently abled persons: The resources on this web-page will help in making your e-Lectures accessible to differently abled person (DAP).

Some more useful tips about video recording can be found here. If you have time, a very good resource about "how to present your content" is here.