Close your eyes and imagine replacing everyone sitting in a room listening to a lecture. Or even trying to get everyone to log into zoom, hear the presenter and try to ask and answer questions. It’s painful, isn’t it?!
Now open your eyes and watch a video at a time that suits you, with a structure and content that’s both engaging and time effective. Doesn’t that sound better?
What are Educational Videos?
The term ‘educational video’ may be misleading, and an unsuitable name. Let’s be honest, it even sounds quite boring. But that actually doesn’t have to be the case. From how-to videos to instructional and training videos, there is a wide range of possibilities.
Educational videos are videos that are designed specifically to educate or inform on a particular topic. Typically, they teach the viewer new knowledge about a process or skill. They can be used in many different ways. For example:
- Making lessons and lectures more accessible and engaging
- Training videos for new and existing staff
- Instructional videos for customers on how to use a product
- Video tutorials on how to do something with step-by-step tutorials
Benefits of Using Educational Videos
Companies that use educational videos have found that they are better at retaining knowledge and understanding of the subject matter because the person is able to watch it at their own pace without having someone read it to them.
Video learning may be more effective than many people realise according a recent study
“Probably because we cut out all of the rubbish and we edit ourselves to be more concise. We lose all of the irrelevant stories, and students can skip the parts of our lectures that they think are boring” says Michael Noetel, the study’s lead author and a psychologist at Australian Catholic University
On-demand video learning
They can be watched anywhere, any time. So forget trying to arrange everyone’s schedule or having someone away or sick that misses out. With pre-recorded educational videos, students learn and people watch lessons and lectures on their own schedule, consuming as much or as little of the content as they can.
Rewind or watch again
With videos, there is the ability to go back and rewatch or review content as needed. This is great for people who need a little more time to absorb and learn about important content.
Measurable engagement levels
By injecting personality and making your videos fun, you can increase student engagement, staff engagement and all your audience attention levels. By uploading your video to platforms like YouTube and E-learning materials, you can track how long people watch, when they stop and how engaged they are.
Easily scalable and cost effective
Whether you aim to teach 10, 1,000, or 10,000 people, video content scales to whatever size you need. Forget paying for lectures to travel around the world or trying to arrange multiple day events. Learners can consume education videos when and how it suits them, with no restrictions on time zones or geographic locations.
Content is reusable
Video content can be refined and improved as needed. Imagine needing to teach the same learning material to a new audience every year. Video has the ability to have sections replaced, changed and even removed, relatively quickly.
Bitesize shorter videos
Instead of trying to teach someone everything at once, you can break topics into bite size pieces, produce a series of short videos and reduce cognitive load. You can then combine them all into one longer video and use the different lengths on different marketing channels.
8 Steps for educational video production
Work smarter, not harder, with proper planning.
The key to producing an effective educational video is having a well-planned script. This is because without a script, you can end up with a video that lacks coherence. Here are eight steps to produce the best educational videos:
1. Define your purpose
What is the main idea you want to convey? What is the learning objective? When creating educational videos, you should start by identifying the subject, the topic, the audience, and your goal for the video. Once you know what your video should accomplish, create a plan that does it.
2. Gather any information you need
The best videos will include visual elements like motion graphics or animations, and other elements that help keep the viewer’s attention. Collect everything from images to statistics, other video material and more.
3. Write a script
Nothing ruins a great video faster than ‘umms’ and ‘ahhs’, hesitations or a person trying to remember what they wanted to say next. By writing a script, you can have a plan, maintain focus throughout and make your video look more professional.
4. Storyboard your video
Once your plan is in place, it is time for storyboarding! Storyboarding your video will help you identify potential problems with shots and transitions. It will also make it clear on where and what you will be filming and needing to create.
5. Organise the day of filming
Plan your locations, timing and props all ready for the big day. The more you plan, the less chaotic it will be on the day. Also it will mean you don’t miss a shot
6. D Day
Take the camera out and hit record. Thanks to all that planning, this should actually be the easy part.
7. Edit your video
You’ve recorded amazing footage, and now it's time to jump into video creation and put it all together on a timeline. Add other information like the images and motion graphics you planned in step 2, and produce a video ready to get people learning.
8. Share your video
Once you're finished editing your video, you’re ready to share your high quality video to the world. From sharing files directly to hosting them e-learning platforms or posting them on your marketing channels.
Tips to Ensure your Educational Video is Accessible
The following are some tips to ensure that your educational video is accessible for people with disabilities and learning challenges.
Tip: Accessible content is actually better for everyone
Add captions
Every educational video you make should include captions. Captions ensure that any words spoken, as well as any relevant sounds are displayed on the screen so that people who are deaf or hard of hearing can read them.
In fact, every video you ever make should include captions as it helps reach a wider audience and allows people to watch with the volume turned up (particularly for those in loud environments or on public transport).
Tip: Be sure to use closed captions rather than open captions to ensure students can turn them on or off as needed.
Make a video transcript
A video transcript is a text version of your video. They’re helpful for both people who are deaf or hard of hearing, as well as those who are blind or visually impaired. For viewers with audio difficulties, they can read the transcript directly, while those who have visual impairments can use a screen reader to access the educational content.
Consider contrast levels
When using text on screen, you need to think about the colour and size of the font. If it’s too small, it’s not legible to see, let alone read. This extends further than just screen text. Consider trying to watch a video of someone wearing a light blue jumper with a bright blue sky behind them.
By being aware of colours in your planning, and considering the screen resolution people can watch your videos on, for example phones, you will be able to produce a stronger educational video.
Final thoughts
Great educational videos can improve student and others learning outcomes, educate your audience further and assist in training new skills. And now you know that creating the most effective and engaging educational videos doesn’t even have to be hard. With proper planning and thinking about the learning goals and outcomes, you can help your audience learn better with video.
Hire Us for Your Educational Video Needs
We understand that it can be difficult to find a company who can provide you with the best educational video needs. We work with you to make sure that we give you the best service and product for your needs.
We’re a team of professional video producers who are highly skilled and experienced in creating training videos. Not only can we provide the best quality videos, we also provide excellent customer service.
