Improving student engagement with asynchronous video content by learning from youtubers

Since the COVID-19 pandemic there has been an increasing shift within higher education away from traditional lectures and towards asynchronous content delivery through pre-recorded videos. This has a number of benefits: students can consume content at their own pace, videos can be reused, and production value can be increased. However, academics typically have no training or experience in video production, so pre-recorded videos are most often just a simulacrum of a standard lecture (i.e., a slideshow with voiceover). Analytics and student feedback indicate that this style is not engaging.

Parallel to this shift has been the increasing popularity of educational “youtubers”. Many youtubers (e.g., CGP Grey, Vsauce, Kurzgesagt) are successful enough to earn a full time income, often for multiple people, from creating and distributing educational videos online.

This project aims to improve student engagement with asynchronous video content by identifying and emulating successful strategies used by educational youtubers. Possible activities include:

• a structured review of educational youtube content
• developing and evaluating educational videos
• building guidelines or a framework to help other academics improve their asynchronous content

Your contributions have the potential to have real impact. Any video resources developed will focus on introductory programming, and be distributed through the open education resource The Programmer's Field Guide (https://programmers.guide/), which is used by thousands of students each year. We also hope to engage with you as a person, and to help you develop in the areas you are wanting to focus on.