Creating Effective Videos for eLearning
Video based elearning is an effective tool that can be used to improve retention and appeal to a variety of learning styles by including diverse media such as video and audio clips, graphics and animations. They are a great way to illustrate skills and techniques that might be too complicated to explain. It is estimated that over 6 billion hours of video are viewed on YouTube every month, so it is obviously a medium that is here to stay. When creating videos for your elearning here are some tips to keep in mind:
Learning and Business Outcomes – clearly defining your business and learning outcomes is essential before beginning. Keep focused on these to help you stay on track when creating your videos.
Short is Best – the most effective learning videos are 3 minutes or less and It might be the most important aspect of the video. The idea is to have short, bite-sized vignettes that can be easily digested by the learner. If you have a large amount of content that’s fine, just break them up little chunks as very few people have the time to watch a 30 – 60 minute video. Also, the longer the video, the lower the rate of retention.
Include Audio Narration – the most effective way for most people to remember what they’ve learned is when they can both see and hear it. Write a script to go with your video and match it to the animations on the screen, or any text that you are using as well.
Knowledge Assessments – if you embed your videos into your elearning program, include knowledge assessments for immediate feedback. Reports can be generated to shine a light on where the strengths and weaknesses are in your learners and you can provide more support accordingly.
Some material is either too abstract or too large in scale to be communicated in a classroom setting, so using videos to communicate these concepts visually is an effective tool to use. It can be used in virtually any learning program to communicate content in a clear visually appealing way to maximize retention.
