Taking a Fresh Look at the Value of Video in Online Learning

The chapter explores video to facilitate learning in Higher Education by discussing the literature about the effectiveness of video use in teaching and considering underpinning pedagogy. Many institutions and academics worldwide are trying to make sense of students’ emerging expectations, requirements, and the means to meet these uncertainties surrounding every aspect. The landscape of education is evolving with changes to where students study and technological advances driving the need for comparable or improved learning experiences online. One of the most challenging areas to transition online may be developing complicated practical or professional skills that have historically been acquired in a classroom or on work placements, e.g., difficult negotiations or technical engineering skills. Strategies such as asynchronous video and synchronous video conferencing have been commonly used to transition learning online to date. Evidence exists for the supplementary use of video in addition to traditional online methods to augment learning attainment only if carefully designed. The evidence supporting video to develop practical professional skills is reviewed to highlight key findings and summarise applications to practice. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the growing body of evidence supporting learning design considerations in this area and offers an underpinning theoretical framework to consider how video materials can be incorporated with other activities. Online curriculum design with integrated video is highly challenging to those who may be inexperienced, display low digital fluency, inflexible views, or limited digital tool access. However, this chapter aims to offer a coherent stepped approach to video construction within online curriculum design that is evidence-based and theoretically reasoned.

Keywords: Behaviourism, Cognitivism, Constructivism, Curriculum Design, Digital Education, E-Learning, Flipped Learning, Higher Education, Multimedia, Online learning, Online Media, Pedagogy, Professional Skills, Practical Skills, Social Cognitive Theory, Students, Teachers, Video, Video Learning, YouTube.