McCauley Media Group

This web page, influenced by my work over the last 15+ years, represents a curation of resources for fellow educators who are interested in taking advantage of media resources to enhance teaching and learning from Pre-K through Higher Education. Feel free to explore and take advantage of these resources as you see fit, and please cite this page if possible! Thank you.

Overview

There are countless ways that you can use media in your instruction; and just as many ways that you can create and distribute that media content. What is most important is to ensure that we are using the media in meaningful ways that truly support and enhance our pedagogy and our learning objectives. If the media we are using fails to do that, then it doesn’t matter how engaging, exciting, or fashionable it is.

Interestingly, the “Great Media Debate” still rages in academia. CEHD’s own Robert Tennyson (EPSY) is one of the leaders in this field and has published a number of articles around media as related to learning theories and instructional design. One of the seminal pieces on this topic is Tennyson’s “Big Wrench” article from ETR&D (1994). At the core of this article is the idea that there is no one tool or approach that will meet all of our instructional goals, and so using media in our instruction must always be approached with the needs of the learner in mind.

Still, whether or not you believe that media influences learning, it remains crucial in today’s learning environments. As courses continue to transition into flipped, hybridized, and online models, we need to be able to create and share engaging media content to communicate important ideas and concepts to our students. And with a population that is becoming more and more media savvy, we need to be able to curate and/or produce high quality content that is highly informational, engaging, and current.

Lastly, if you plan to create your own instructional media, remember that production of high quality, engaging media for your courses can take a lot of time. Although there are a number of benefits to using media as a learning tool, be prepared to spend a significant amount of time in both planning and production, whether you do it yourself or work with our team to create these assets for your course.

Recommendations

Design Strategy

According to “The Check” (our guide to online course design), all “materials and media [should be] current, working properly, available in multiple formats, and accurately cited throughout the course.” The natural progression of these guidelines would prescribe that all media used in your course should be of high quality, highly informational, and also highly engaging. Attaining all of these goals can be difficult, but with the help of our DEI team, you should be able to reach them.

Engagement

It is important to consider student engagement and adhere to best practices in regards to the use of media in your courses. There has been some research on this topic, and we encourage you to refer to some relatively recent articles on media use and student engagement .

The most important takeaways from the data are these:

1. Shorter videos are more engaging (less than 3 minutes).

   • This varies according to content and style. Some content may really need 6 minutes, and if presented properly, will still be engaging. In addition, required viewing increases engagement.

2. Direct connections to course content means higher view numbers

   • There seems to be a “sweet spot” at around 6-10 minutes for course specific content.

3. Quality, tone, and visuals matter

   • Higher production value = more retention (i.e., poor audio will lose viewers quickly).

4. Longer form content (such as lectures) can (and should) be broken up into shorter segments if possible.

   • This of course requires editing so be prepared to tackle that challenge if need be.

Accessibility

Best practices include providing captioning and transcripts for all media in your course, not only for students with disabilities, but also those with different learning preferences and varying levels of access to online content. Refer to the section below on transcription or the page on Accessibility for more details.

Getting Started

DIY

If you feel comfortable diving in and learning to produce media on your own, you are surely welcome to do that, and there are many different resources available to help you get started. At the top of the list of resources is Lynda.com . Lynda.com is a leading online learning platform that helps anyone learn business, software, technology, and creative skills to achieve personal and professional goals. Currently, The University of Minnesota has a subscription to lynda.com, meaning that it is free to use for all UMN affiliates. Learn to record video, edit in iMovie or Adobe Premiere, create stunning PowerPoint presentations, or start your own podcasts all through concise, well crafted tutorials here on this site on your own time.

Consultation

The DEI team is available to you year round to consult on your media production goals. You can meet with one of our Instructional Designers to see what media assets would best support your teaching and learning objectives, or you can meet with our Media Producer to discuss details of video and or audio production including pre-production, recording, editing, distribution, and budget. The media production services we offer are free of charge when it comes to creating media for classes, and we can offer expert advise on budget and scope when it comes to grant funded or external communications projects.

Resources

In addition to DEI’s media production services, there are other resources available to you here at the University of Minnesota, both for consultation and production assistance. Academic Technology Support Services (ATSS) in the Office of Information Technology offers professional media production services and consultation to aid in the creation of media for UMN courses; Library Media Services offers tools, assistance, and consultation in support of student-generated media such as media assignments or digital storytelling; and OIT also has a video services unit (OIT Video) that offers recording, capturing, and streaming of events at a very low cost to UMN affiliates. Basic video recording equipment can be checked out from the Curriculum & Instruction Library in Peik or from the STEM center in LES.

STOCK FOOTAGE: You can also download video, audio, and imagery from stock libraries to use in media presentations. Usually these are fee-based subscription services, but the University has subscribed to one big one for us all to use. Read more about that here: https://it.umn.edu/service-details/stock-content

In addition, you can browse University-specific stock content from this library: https://photo-video.umn.edu/

Video Production Tools

There are a myriad of great tools available to you to help produce media for your courses. We’ll break these down into tools for Pre-Production, Recording, Editing/Post-Production, and Distribution.

Pre-Production

Writing, Scripting, Storyboarding, and "Production Coordination":

The writing process is one of the most important stages in the process. Whether you are creating a full-blown narrative from scratch, or planning to build a documentary based on expert interviews, it is still very important to start “on paper” with a written summary of your plan.

The usual order of script creation is as follows:

• Treatment or summary

  • A “treatment” is simply a very short (one or two paragraph) summary of the media project including the goals and main points to be addressed. Other preliminary details can be included if you wish, but this is meant to be a simple, short overview of the project to begin correspondence about the project.

• Outline

  • Building on the treatment, an outline can start to flesh out the different content areas of the media project, who will be interviewed, locations, more main topics to communicate, and timelines. This can also be a start to scheduling your team and coordinate other details outside of the content.

• Script

  • Scripts can take on many forms and formats, but ultimately the script should reflect a fairly detailed representation of the final video (at least the first full draft). A favorite format of video editors is the “side by side” script format, which uses a simple two-column table to delineate what the viewer hears and sees as they watch the piece. If you’re working with a client of any kind, having a detailed script for them to sign off on before starting the production process (recording, etc) is usually a good idea.

  • Here is a sample side-by-side script document (make a copy for yourself to edit)

• Storyboard

  • Storyboards are usually used primarily for narrative storytelling pieces, where you want to “pre-visualize” what the story is going to look like on the screen. Primarily composed of illustrations or photographs, a storyboard allows the creators to rearrange the images to consider how the images work together in order and in context to each other. Nowadays, something as simple as PowerPoint or Google Slides can be a powerful tool for storyboarding. (NOTE: I don’t usually create or use storyboards unless I need to clearly communicate specific shot compositions to the camera operator)

  • Here is a sample storyboard document for reference. A blank version can be found here.

  • Here is another sample storyboard document (make a copy for yourself to edit)

"Production coordination" refers to the preparation process in advance of producing your own media content. If you intend to create a lot of media for your course (by yourself or with our team), it is not only important to plan out the content carefully, but to also spend time planning out how the media assets will be created, the resources needed, schedules of people involved, and more. Here are a few items I employ on a regular basis:

• Shot sheet

  • Building off the script or storyboard, a shot sheet outlines all the shots and camera angles that need to be captured to properly convey the script as it appears on paper. Refer back to this list as you record in order to make sure you capture everything needed while you have the resources available to you.

• Shooting schedule

  • Building off the shot sheet, the shooting schedule outlines the agenda for shooting all the shots needed, coordinating the crew, talent, equipment, location, and other details to make sure that you gather all the shots needed within the time you have available.

• Call sheets

  • Call sheets are documents that communicate all the detailed specifics to your crew. For example, locations, scheduling, parking and contact information, meal information (if applicable) are important to share with your entire team, especially in advance of a tightly scheduled recording session.

Thus, as you can see, there can be a lot of work that takes place even before any recording happens. In many ways, it is the MOST IMPORTANT work, as this is where you determine what content will be covered, how it will be produced, and how it will be structured for the learner. This can be time consuming, so don't try to bite off too much if you're just starting to create media content for your course. Start small!

Recording

The best entry-level tools for recording these days are our smartphones (that's a video) and tablets. These devices record high-quality video and audio with built-in apps, making it easy to get started. You can add some inexpensive accessories like mounts, stabilizers, microphones, and lighting in order to increase the quality and production value of your recordings. You can quickly and easily transfer your recordings to a computer for editing, or you can perform fairly robust editing and post production within the devices themselves, making them stand alone production studios on their own.

If you are more of a traditionalist, you can always record with dedicated video cameras or audio recorders. Recording with higher-end equipment may yield more professional looking results, but it usually comes with a higher level of complexity in order to process your recordings into shareable media.

Should you decide to explore this route, you can always purchase equipment of your own, but you may also want to check out equipment from places like the Curriculum & Instruction Library in Peik, the STEM center in LES, the CEHD Dean’s Office, Library Media Services, or public access media organizations. You can also rent professional-grade equipment from either a local business or online service.

In addition, the Office of Information Technology at UMN provides several 1-Button Studios located around campus for you to record super high-quality video presentations for classes or professional reasons. These are free to everyone at the University and easy to use.

Remember, the DEI team is here to consult with you at every step of the way. We highly recommend that you meet with us before you take on any media production project, no matter how large or small.

Transcription!

If you are recording interviews, you may want to consider having those recordings transcribed. Often we need to scan through interview footage to find the content we want, and it can be tiresome. With a transcript document, you can quickly scan through the text without being distracted by the way a person speaks, their speed, or maybe just getting lost in interesting content. You can also do keyword searches, highlight areas with different colors according to content or relevance, and even do some “editing on paper” without even touching the media files or video editing software. Transcriptions can be easily shared across team members via Google Drive or similar for editorial decision making.

One really good low-cost option for transcription is Rev.com--they are fast, cheap, AND good. For $1 per minute of recording time, they will transcribe your files around in 24 hours (usually). Another great thing about transcriptions is that when you are done editing, you have a pre-made transcript of your final piece ready to submit to YouTube for syncing and captioning.

Editing/Post-Production

I firmly believe that the best editing tool is whatever tool is the easiest for you to access and understand. Again, there are many tools cross-referenced in other pages of this Treks course site, so make sure you review those in addition to this. A curated list of post-production tools for course media are as follows:

Computer-based and online tools:

Adobe Spark: Adobe’s new storytelling tool offers opportunities to create a number of different media artifacts across multiple platforms. FREE and available for mobile devices as well.

Adobe Premiere Rush: Rush is a very low cost video editing platform available across multiple devices and operating systems, which syncs to your account in the cloud so you can work on the same projects across multiple devices. Similar to Spark video, but packed with more features.

Adobe Premiere / Adobe Premiere Elements: Adobe Premiere is the best video editing software available today, available on a subscription basis from Adobe. The “Elements” version is a lightweight version which costs much less to purchase.

VoiceThread: VoiceThread is a collaborative, multimedia slideshow that holds images, documents, and videos and allows people to navigate slides and leave comments. VoiceThread runs inside your web browser, so there is no additional software required. At the University of Minnesota, you must log in via Moodle or Canvas to use VoiceThread.

Screencast-O-Matic: This software allows you to record your screen, with or without a webcam insert. Very similar to Camtasia (with slightly fewer editing features), it is available for free to all University of Minnesota affiliates. This is a software download that needs to be installed to your machine, but there is also an online-only version.

Camtasia - this software is a very robust video editing tool, based on a screen capture application. An excellent tool for combining traditional recordings with screen captures and more.

iMovie - this free, full-featured video editing app comes pre-installed on all Mac computers.

Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve: Relatively new to the scene, this is a FREE but POWERFUL suite of video editing tools, including an entry level video editing interface called simply, "Cut". Available for Windows or Mac OS.

Lightworks - This free editing software features a robust tool set and is available for Mac, Windows, or Linux.

WeVideo - This is an online video editing tool, allowing you to upload media and edit from any computer or device. They offer a free account with a small limit on storage, but it watermarks all your final pieces.

Final Cut Pro - Apple’s premiere editing software has come a long way and is comparable to Adobe Premiere in many ways.

Quicktime - Apple’s Quicktime software allows for some minimal trimming of video files, and may be just right if all you need to do is trim your clips before publishing.

PowerPoint / Keynote - You can do a lot with video right inside these presentation tools.

Smartphone/Tablet-based tools:

Adobe Spark: This FREE app is available for mobile devices as well!

Adobe Premiere Rush: Rush is a very low cost video editing platform available across multiple devices and operating systems, which syncs to your account in the cloud so you can work on the same projects across multiple devices. Similar to Spark video, but packed with more features.

VoiceThread: VoiceThread is available for mobile devices as well.

Techsmith mobile apps: the company that makes Camtasia does make apps for your mobile device as well, and the recordings can sync with Camtasia fairly easily.

iMovie for iPad / iPhone - Apple has a version of its editing tool for IOS.

Pinnacle Studio Pro - this app, available for a fee, is a very robust video & audio editing app rivaling the best desktop applications.

WeVideo - this app is available for both IOS and Android.

Adobe Premiere Clip - (IOS and Android) allows you to do some basic editing on your device before sharing with the full Adobe suite of tools on a desktop.

Camera App and Audio Recorder tools - the camera and audio recorder apps on your device have some limited editing ability, mostly trimming clips. But you can trim multiple sections and save as multiple clips - possibly eliminating the need for further editing.

(See this link for more apps for IOS)

(See this link for more apps for Android)

Make your own animated videos!

In recent years, a number of online services have cropped up that allow you to create your own animated videos. These can be useful to illustrate abstract concepts, explain processes or historical happenings, or create a visual component to narrative storytelling. There are many of these services and tools available at varying levels of cost for subscription. Begin exploring these tools with Biteable, which offers a low-level free subscription and then builds on that for premium accounts.

Distribution

Once you have finalized your media, there are endless possibilities for distribution. Your best choice will be determined by what level of privacy, security, and accessibility you want your videos to have. Here are the most common distribution tools for course-based media assets:

Kaltura MediaSpace: Kaltura is a media management system for the distribution of media in online courses using Canvas. This cloud solution automatically optimizes files for viewing on any device and tracks usage and other analytics. Kaltura is only accessible through Canvas and is only for course-related materials.

YouTube: YouTube is available to all students, faculty, staff and departments through the Google Apps suite of tools, and it is free and easy to use. Upload a video and share it with your class or create a shared account to promote your organization.

Vimeo: Vimeo is a popular video distribution site, similar to YouTube but with less advertising and different tools for sharing and privacy control. You may wish to consider using this site instead of YouTube if you want to have further control over student access to your course media but are not interested in locking up your media in Kaltura.

Google Drive: With Google Drive, you can create and share files and folders online and collaborate with others on group projects. Files in Google Drive can be accessed from any smartphone, tablet, or computer. This applies to video files just as it does any other type of file. Google Drive also allows contributors to watch the video files using a player similar to YouTube. Using Google Drive to share video files also allows you to exert more specific privacy and access controls than some of the other sharing tools.

Media Production as Academic Assignments

Media content generated by students for assignments become part of a transformative learning process that goes beyond traditional writing and research, all while reiterating and supporting those fundamental learning experiences. By "transformative learning," we mean a process by which students experience a deeper learning outcome as a result of further personal investment in the process--by being content creators and authors themselves, by feeling more ownership over the materials created, by knowing that this content will be shared to a wider audience than just their instructor (friends, family, future employers, etc.).

Creation

In recent years the practice of "digital storytelling" has become increasingly popular in learning environments, mainly due to the meaningful learning benefits inherent to the practice. But there are many challenges to implementing these assignments properly in your course, and we recommend taking some time to learn more about those challenges before attempting to incorporate assignments like these into your curriculum.

Popular forms of digital storytelling may come in videos, podcasts, or blogs, but students can also create digital artifacts such as animated videos and web cartoons/comics, to express their narratives. Consider checking out tools with free to subscription versions, such as Moovly, Toondoo, or PowToon. You may also be interested in having students create a meme using Google Drawing as a creative way of sharing story.

To learn more about digital storytelling, talk to a DEI team member or visit these recommended links:

• The Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling: University of Houston Website

• The Changing Story: eBook by Linda Buturian

• Digital Storytelling at UMN: a free self-guided course on implementing DS assignments in your course

Collaboration/Discussion

Using media to collaborate on assignments is a great way to get students engaged. Google Drive can be a good way of collaborating on documents, but students may also be interested in using video tools to discuss and collaborate.

Canvas video discussion: Did you know that embedded within the Canvas discussion area is a tool that allows students to record responses directly within Canvas? The "play" button in a new discussion thread just requires students have Flash enabled and updated for this feature to work.

Flipgrid: Flipgrid is a video-based forum students can use in lieu of a traditional text-base forum. It can also be used by you as the instructor to create short videos as well. Because Flipgrid was developed at UMN, it is free for University faculty, staff, and students to use.

Google Sites: This free software, available through the Google suite, allows students to create their own simple websites.

VideoAnt: VideoAnt is a web-based video annotation tool for mobile and desktop devices, which can be used by instructors and students alike. Use VideoAnt to add annotations, or comments, to web-hosted videos.

VoiceThread: VoiceThread is a collaborative, multimedia slide show tool that can be used to present images, documents, and videos. It allows people to navigate slides and leave asynchronous text, audio or video comments.

Conclusion

Media assets contribute to a number of benefits for teaching and learning, but the curation, development, and implementation of these assets can take a lot of time and energy, both in the design and the production of the media for your course. Whether you are curating/producing these media assets on your own or in cooperation with our or another team here at the University, please be sure to take the time to consider how the use of this media will best support your learning objectives, and be prepared to spend a healthy amount of time in the development and production of your media assets.

Be sure to contact the DEI team if you have any questions at all related to media production for your courses.

Thank you!