The power of video in higher education cannot be underestimated. More than 92% of students have reported that videos positively impact their educational journeys, helping them make the most of their time in school.
Leveraging video content is a great way to boost learning and engagement for students of all ages. However, this is easier said than done. This article explores ways that video content can improve engagement among users and student engagement techniques that improve the usage of educational video content over time. Other topics covered are:
- Educational video content definition
- Challenges of creating educational videos
- Student engagement techniques for best ROI
- Tools for student video engagement
What Is Educational Video Content?
Put simply, educational video content is anything that is:
- Informative
- Practical
- Share-worthy
These videos usually have a certain objective, such as a learning module or practical skill. The videos can appear in many formats, from short snippets to long-form lectures, but they should ultimately be used to improve the knowledge and learning of the viewer.
The benefits of educational video within a school setting have been well documented over the years. Videos may lead to higher grades for students and better engagement in the classroom. Finding new ways of incorporating educational video into your workflow could improve student engagement and learning outcomes by a large degree.
Challenges of Creating Educational Videos
According to educators, there are three major challenges in the creation of engaging student videos:
- Measuring Analytics: It can be difficult to determine how many students are truly engaging with your videos, especially without the right tools.
- Meta Tagging: Improperly tagging your videos could lead to disorganization, confusion, and the loss of key asset files.
- Storing Videos Securely: With ransomware and phishing attacks on the rise, choosing a safe and secure video hosting platform should be top of mind.
Choosing a high-quality hosting platform such as Warpwire can help alleviate some of these pressures. However, understanding all best video practices is the best and most effective way to improve video usage.
Five Student Engagement Techniques for Best ROI
Students want to engage with educational videos that are informative, entertaining, and polished with best practices. Here are five important steps for maximizing higher ed student engagement.
1. Focus on shorter length
Studies have shown that shorter videos maintain longer attention spans when they are under two minutes long. If possible, optimize your videos to run between thirty seconds and one minute. If your video content is longer, consider splitting the footage into multiple sections.
2. Add high-quality voice-overs
Voice-overs in video content have been proven to increase brand awareness by 54% and drive content engagement by a large degree. If a teacher or professor is willing to discuss their content in a video format, supply them with high-quality microphones to capture crisp audio.
3. Create subtitles or captions
From an accessibility standpoint, the creation of subtitles and captions for your video is a must-have. From an engagement standpoint, it’s an incredibly powerful tool. Warpwire offers multiple ways to add captions to your content, from manual upload options to closed-caption services.
4. Consider student-generated videos
One of the most underutilized student engagement techniques involves user-generated content (UGC). Allow students to create and share videos for other classmates to see, prompting engagement from other learners. UGC may even increase student participation in group settings.
5. Add graphics and a host
Hosting and graphic elements within an educational video can be powerful. An enthusiastic yet non-distracting host can enhance learning outcomes by supplying necessary social cues for knowledge retention. In addition, recent studies have suggested that the use of graphics in videos may improve student recall rates and memory.
Tools for Video Engagement
Student engagement levels could be boosted even further with the proper integration of video tools. Here are three popular platforms used to increase student engagement.
Premiere Pro
A powerful video editing software, Premiere Pro is the industry standard for video editing. Although it provides many ways to engage students with special effects, lighting options, and colorful additions, it cannot organize or host video content.
Vidyard
Vidyard is a popular tool for hosting videos to track engagement rates. According to the company’s website, they currently host over 4 million customers. However, Vidyard does not offer a free trial period, and the platform may be difficult to learn for first-time video hosters. Furthermore, they have certain security issues that may be concerning for higher ed organizations.
Warpwire
Founded as a live production company in 2013, Warpwire focuses on increasing video engagement for students in colleges and universities. By offering myriad software distribution plans, Warpwire shows that it is passionate about video security and integration with current organizational tech stacks.
Warpwire’s video platform provides analytics to help you track media assets, media libraries, and system-wide usage. Designed to explore engagement, Warpwire’s reports provide deep insight into how your institution interacts with media.
To see how we can help you better leverage your video content, get in touch with us today!
