You are working from home. Your kids are learning from home. Both of you depend on the internet and learning videos to keep the process of business and learning as normal as possible. You watch a corporate video production from your boss to learn more about new office policies and projects. Your kids watch educational videos, too, from their teachers.
However, you noticed that a lot of these educational videos aren’t well-made. They are grainy. They do not have captions. Kids cannot concentrate on them because all the subject does is to talk. There are no animations, graphics, and illustrations. So, you decided to reach out to your kids’ school administration to talk about how to make video learning more fun. What can you suggest?
Reiterate Visually
The teachers will need to speak a whole lot in videos. Not only will they speak while they are on the camera, but they will use their voice, too, when the video transitioned to animations and infographics. If you want your students to remember what you’re saying, reiterate those visually. Ask yourself: what are the key points that my students need to remember the most? Focus on those statements and put them on the screen.
Remember that out of all our senses, our sensory memory holds the most information. But, it is also quickly forgotten. Feeding information to multiple senses (audio and visual) will keep that memory alive. It will likely turn that memory into a short- or even long-term memory.
Make Short Videos
If the teacher has a one-hour class, make short videos to fill up the time. That means breaking down the topics into 10-minute videos that the students can play within a specified time. Give them some work to do in between watching the videos. Send them worksheets, so they can apply what they learned on the 10-minute videos before letting them play the next one.
State What They Will Learn from the Video
Make sure that your students know what to expect from the videos. If they are going to watch these blindly, they will not look forward to what they will learn. Spend the first few seconds of the video telling them what they will do after the video is done. Interest them enough in the activities, so that they’ll give you the 10 minutes of attention you need to discuss an idea, theory, or concept.
Parents and children will need to rely on videos for the next year or so, both for work and learning. If you noticed that your kids’ learning videos aren’t as nicely-produced as your corporate video production, don’t hesitate to talk to their teachers about it. This is a new normal, and everyone should offer help when needed.