Bringing Your Educational Program To Life With Video

We have seen a huge increase in classroom views of our video content in recent times. Very popular and highly engaging if done right, video is the new must have to bring your education program to life. As the professional face of many of our videos our Senior Education Manager and presenter, Katey Street, shares her top tips for getting it right.

1. Engagement is really important!
   Research shows that a young attention span can be less than 2 seconds. So if we can’t grab students’ attention in the first 2 seconds of a video then we’ve lost them. The content needs to be really engaging all the way through from the music to the props, external talent and B roll overlay. Even me, when I’m on a screen I know I need to be 200% more Katey than I normally am!
2. Keep it short and succinct!
   Videos need to be short. Anything longer than five minutes and you can start to lose attention. The goal is to use the video as a stimulus for learning, providing some key information and questions which students go on to explore further.
3. Bring in your industry experts
   There is nothing better than hearing directly from industry experts about the cool things they do every day. So we try and interview people who have great stories to tell. We ask them to talk about their jobs and skills, giving students a meaningful insight to the real world.
4. Kids love interactive videos
   A big part of our videos is encouraging interactivity. We want to give students opportunities to develop their own learning whether through questions, challenges or activities that we display on screen. Previously classroom videos were about relaying information without much thought about how students engaged with it. So when we create videos we always ensure there is an interactive component. It means the students will become more invested in it
5. Consider live streaming videos
   Watching video live is a truly engaging experience. We love interviewing industry experts giving students a sneak peak into their workplace and enabling them to direct their learning by asking the questions they are really interested in. With the proper setup it’s easy to live stream the videos all around the country. We’ve even had classrooms from New Zealand and Japan dial in for these sessions.
6. Think about all aspects of the video presentation
   I’m a trained teacher so I’m used to talking to young people, but if you haven’t done this before I would recommend practicing to get your tone and energy level right. Make sure the background is appropriate for schools and everyone is wearing clothes that will film well and you have good lighting is really important. Props are also a great addition. We’ve had Olympic athletes share their medals, bone scientists bring a skeleton, farmers with their animals and even baby chicks hatch on screen. Take advantage of scope of this visual medium. Students love this.

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