Of this entire website, this section on interactivity is probably the most important, and it has less to do with video itself than what surrounds it. It is widely accepted that students learn best when they are actively engaged in the process of learning, or, as Bonwell and Eison (1991) put it, when learning “involves students in doing things and thinking about the things they are doing.” (p.2) Time and time again, research shows that simply watching a video is not the most effective learning tactic, regardless of its format, delivery, or quality (Koedinger, McLaughlin, Kim, Jia, & Bier, 2015; Seidel & Renkl, 2013). The effectiveness of video is contingent on the presence of accompanying practice and activities (Zhang, Zhou, Briggs, & Nunamaker, 2006). But practice alone is not effective unless you provide feedback (Fiorella & Mayer, 2018; van der Meij, Rensink, & van der Meij, 2018). In this section we discuss the following:
Intersperse video with ungraded knowledge check questions to help students stay focused and remember information better
Consider providing guiding questions for students to consider and answer while watching a video to signal what is important and prompt higher-level thinking
Consider providing a note-taking worksheet to engage students as they watch a video
Use videos as instigating content for students to explain what they’ve learned, compare and contrast examples, analyze scenarios, practice skills, or reflect on personal experience
Bonwell, C. C., & Eison, J. A. (1991). Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. ERIC Clearinghouse on Higher Education, The George Washington University. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED336049.pdf
Fiorella, L., & Mayer, R. E. (2018). What works and doesn't work with instructional video. Computers in Human Behavior, 89, 465-470. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2018.07.015
Koedinger, K. R., Kim, J., Jia, J. Z., McLaughlin, E. A., & Bier, N. L. (2015, March). Learning is not a spectator sport: Doing is better than watching for learning from a MOOC. In Proceedings of the second (2015) ACM conference on learning@ scale (pp. 111-120). https://doi.org/10.1145/2724660.2724681
Seidel, T., Blomberg, G., & Renkl, A. (2013). Instructional strategies for using video in teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education, 34, 56-65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2013.03.004
van der Meij, H., Rensink, I., & van der Meij, J. (2018). Effects of practice with videos for software training. Computers in Human Behavior, (Special issue), 439-445. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.11.029
Zhang, D., Zhou, L., Briggs, R. O., & Nunamaker Jr, J. F. (2006). Instructional video in e-learning: Assessing the impact of interactive video on learning effectiveness. Information & Management, 43(1), 15-27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.im.2005.01.004