Enhancing The Video Learning Experience
Where videos have been seen as an efficient and passive way of transferring knowledge through learning, this approach is not cutting it anymore for most learners who crave further engagement in their eLearning.
Elements To Take The Video Learning Experience To The Next Level
1. Interactivity Through HTML5
Many video software programs allow videos to be exported in HTML5. This allows for videos to become interactive. You can add in quiz questions, true or false, or open questions to stop the learner and test their knowledge in the moment. This can even provide immediate feedback in the moment based on their answer.
This format provides the ability to add in an accessible contents bar, allowing users to skip to certain parts of a video with ease, especially in videos where they may cover several different points. This also supports just-in-time learning at the point of need. Embedding a video like this onto an internal training resource site is a perfect way to allow easy access to these videos, especially if there is lots of information in one video. Having the ability to easily skip to certain parts quickly will only enhance the experience and ease of use.
Why not add in some interactive hyperlinks while you are at it? These can be super useful during those moments of a video where an individual may want to see or read a bit more information. For example, if the video talks about a book or resource, providing the link to the user at that point can take them straight to the resource in seconds.
2. How About Slowing It Down?
Considering accessibility is a huge part of learning in recent times, especially for video content. One in five of learners have a disability, and it is typically recognized that video transcripts are one of the main ways to support accessibility. However, what about those who need to take in information at a slower pace? Promoting the ability to slow down the pace of video content and enabling these features allows the user to watch at a speed that suits them. It is vital to promote these features where you can, as users may not even know about this when watching video content. It not only allows them to use these features but promotes a positive message to users that consideration for accessibility is taken seriously.
3. The Shorter The Better
We have all heard about microlearning, but it is a huge factor in the video learning experience. When users see a 25-minute-long video, you can expect to see initial negative reactions before they have even started! It is all about getting over the psychological barrier that is creating the negative reaction. How about changing your 25-minute video into 5 x 5-minute videos? It is amazing how this will straightaway provide a psychological change of feeling, like it is not one big piece of learning, and it’s in small chunks. It can even help when coming back to review these videos again in the future.
4. Turning The Experience From Isolated To Social
Users crave social interaction; it is all around us and a part of our day-to-day lives. But why is there an exception for videos in learning? Learning videos may be seen as a way of learning in isolation, but it can be a very easy process to add in social elements to the learning experience.
Promoting comments sections is an easy way to promote social engagement. This is a staple of the YouTube experience, where users share comments, thoughts, and ideas of what they have watched. Connecting this with a social platform is another great way to create a social opportunity. For example, Microsoft Yammer, which is an underused tool within organizations, can be a platform to allow for social engagement with others and tutors.
One of the hardest parts with encouraging social engagement is getting the users to participate, so why not create an incentive for participation? Gamification through rewards by participating can be a simple but effective way to engage users. For example, every time a user posts a question or answers someone else’s comment, they are rewarded points or scores.
Conclusion
Considering the points above, we see that enhancing the video eLearning experience is about adding further elements to the video process to take it from a passive to an engaging learning experience.
