Many educators feel a bit of tension about education research. It’s often not because research reveals something with which educators disagree. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. In many cases research uncovers and champions a truth that educators have known about, or at least felt, for a long time because they’ve watched it unfold in their classrooms.

There’s nothing like preaching to the choir.

What is a bit more rare, but desperately needed, is research that presents an idea and couples it with practical advice on how to implement solutions that account for teachers’ real challenges: lack of time, too many students, bureaucratic requirements, and the like. 

The work to reconcile research and the practical environment never ends.

Educators have been using student-centered learning strategies to improve student learning outcomes for quite some time. (DeBoer, 2002; Norte, 2005; Scott & Buchanan, 1998). Personalised learning, too, has been leveraged by schools and universities to give students what they need when they need it. And while it looks like the verdict may still be out regarding the research substantiating personalised learning, or even clarity on what we mean when we say personalised learning, teachers know that the more opportunity for student-to-teacher interaction, the better a teacher can assess how a student learns. This empowers teachers to craft tailored opportunities for each student to grow.

So why, then, do teachers use student-centered learning activities and create classrooms that make more time for teacher-to-student interaction, but still largely assess student knowledge in traditional ways?

The question is a good one, but implies a more corrosive question: why can’t teachers just do it all? Crafting a thoughtful learning environment, that doesn’t just address each student’s needs but provides equitable and intentional opportunities for development is a demanding task. Assessing it authentically is an equally tricky endeavor.

“Authentic assessment focuses on students using and applying knowledge and skills in real-life settings. Authentic assessment helps students contextualise their learning and to see how real-life conditions or situations, in all their unpredictability, ambiguity and complexity, affect their theoretical knowledge” (UNSW Teaching, 2017).

We’ve known about the power of authentic assessment for some time, and especially that it is contingent upon multiple opportunities for practice and feedback (Grant, 1998). Teachers face a series of challenges when assessing, chiefly, creating summative assessments that can be taken across large groups of students for benchmarking, and then marked efficiently so turnaround is quick.

How much students really learn and the enduring skills they can carry with them often fall by the wayside.

Without downplaying the complexity of designing authentic assessment what are some effective strategies for creating authentic assessments? And how can educators be sure they’re measuring intentionally? While notable progress has been made in the survey sciences when it comes to ensuring questionnaires accurately measure their intended purpose, educators don’t have the luxury of rigorous review and feedback from peers when designing assessment. They can, however, implement some of the following strategies:

Start with the end in mind

Simple as it sounds, the principles of Understanding By Design are as important to assessment design as they are to unit design (Wiggins & McTighe, 1998). Stating learning outcomes and designing assessments that specifically address the learning outcomes will ensure continuity, and more importantly, a focus on student understanding. While it might be tempting to look at learning outcomes created at the beginning of a term and build the assessment to match that list, it is important to examine the extent to which those learning outcomes were in service of learning throughout the course. In addition to clarifying how the assessment is tied to outcomes, taking the time to generate a rubric is a valuable exercise in authenticity.

The act of stating precisely what the assessment ought to measure, and the relative weight of each item will provide waypoints in the design process.

Frontloading the assessment design process with clear outcomes and rubric will take longer and be more arduous, but at least there is a structure for success in place. Creating instructional rubrics, or rubrics that are written in student-friendly language and account for typical student error and misconception, have shown heartening results for improving student writing and support student learning.

Stagger the assessment

While using multiple choice question tests can enhance students’ learning outcomes and their appreciation for the quality of learning experiences, this is most true when the test is for formative purposes (Velan et al., 2008). We’ve all taken multiple choice question tests for summative purposes, especially at the end of a class. While the summative multiple choice question tests can be designed and implemented thoughtfully, it is very difficult to do so.

Taking a divide and conquer approach can alleviate some of the challenges of assessment design and ultimately, better serve students. If you must use multiple-choice questions, let students complete that assessment, auto-marked, and then hold feedback and Q&A sessions to provide students with the opportunity to address their misconceptions and seek guidance.

Ideally, multiple choice questions would measure students’ ability to recall facts and not address higher order thinking.  Instead, after providing feedback, administer a project, essay, simulation, lab, etc. that makes students apply their knowledge. By building a feedback mechanism into the assessment, students will receive a critical piece of support in the learning process. They will be encouraged to engage in important soft skills like asking for help and even providing clarification for other students, which are essential not just for success in school and the workplace, but in making learning stick.

Offer choice

One of the most satisfying experiences in teaching isn’t just watching students “get it” but watching them express ideas and solve problems in a novel manner. The more opportunity students have to express original and creative thinking, the more authentic the learning experience. It’s more rigorous, too.

By designing more than one expository opportunity, application question, scenario problem, business case requiring analysis, etc. students will be able to choose tasks that interest them most. We know that intrinsic motivation is essential for deep learning, but accessing intrinsic motivation can be elusive. Providing choice not only enhances intrinsic motivation, but positively impacts effort, task performance, and perceived competence (Patall, Cooper and Robinson, 2008).

By affording students agency in the assessment experience, students can mitigate their stress and concentrate on sharing their insights.

Better yet, by offering choice over time, teachers can develop choice types and then require students to select from certain choice types. For example, perhaps students are meant to develop divergent thinking and synthesis skills. On the first assessment, allow students to select from long form questions that contain a divergent thinking question and a synthesis skill question. On the second assessment, require that students select a long form question that is of a different type than they have selected previously. By balancing opportunities for choice and nudges for growth, students will experience rigorous learning in a supportive manner.

By respecting teacher time, workload and surfacing relevant research, the education community can make gains in highlighting authentic strategies for teaching and learning, and not just assessing for assessment’s sake.    ← show less

Many educators feel a bit of tension about education research. It’s often not because research reveals something with which educators disagree. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. In many cases research uncovers and champions a truth that educators have known about, or at least felt, for a long time because they’ve watched it unfold in their classrooms.

There’s nothing like preaching to the choir.

What is a bit more rare, but desperately needed, is research that presents an idea and co... read more

Videos are a great way of creating engaging content for an online course. You might have just finished designing some fantastic materials for your course to ensure your videos are ready to go for students to have the best learning experiences possible. However, even with great visuals and script, students may not be able to enjoy your video to its full quality if the audio is unclear. To ensure students are 100% engaged with the content, here are 5 easy tips on how to record professional audio for your online course.

Image credit: Kaicho20 (https://pixabay.com/static/uploads/photo/2015/04/23/21/51/man-736846__340.jpg) & Fukusuke.tokyo (http://fukusuke.tokyo/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/1FotorCreated4.jpg)

You don’t need to be a professional sound engineer to be able to record good audio narration. Having an idea of the two types of audio recording setup, single and double system can be super useful. Single setup means that audio is recorded directly to your camera, while double means that your audio and video is recorded separately. You just have to pick the right setup that meets your needs. While single setup can be a huge timesaver, it does come in a cost, as not a lot of camcorder comes with a robust and professional voice recorder. On the other hand, you can get a good external microphone to support your camera that will not break your budget!

Image credit: Hunts Photo & Video (http://bit.ly/2egXK7D), strats.co (http://i01.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/391207795/microphone_and_professional_lavalier_tie_clip_microphone.jpg), WerbeFabrik (https://pixabay.com/en/studio-microphone-vocal-microphone-1002960/)

Choosing the right equipment is crucial to the success of any project. While most students don’t expect Hollywood-grade post production quality, knowing good equipment choices can assist with the quality of your audio. Make sure you do your research before deciding on which microphones to buy or third-party application to use that can meet your needs. It’s important to note that microphones will sound differently in each person’s voice, so choose one with response characteristics that will make your voice sound the best. If you are low on budget — there is always a way to create DIY microphones. Quick tip: don’t forget to add a pop screen to your microphone to minimise the strong B and P sound, or referred to as ‘plosive’!

Image credit: amazon.com (https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41TkhIqyM6L._SX425_.jpg)

Before you press the record button, make sure to check your surroundings. You’ll be surprised with the amount of background noise that will be included in your recording! Turn off some of the things within your control — such as home appliances like air conditioners, fans, and televisions. Be careful of where and how you position your microphone as well! Try to place it slightly away from your laptop or computer since your PC may create a loud humming noise that can disrupt the quality of your audio. Lastly, remind everyone in the room to be quiet during the recording process.

Once the audio is fully recorded, you can try to perfect the quality by using a free third-party audio software such as Audacity and Garageband. These softwares can help you to eliminate ambient noise from your recording. You can also play around and create your own audio preset that can best suit your taste, such as increasing the bass or removing reverb.

Image credit: Ask.audio (https://macprovid.vo.llnwd.net/o43/hub/media/1130/10962/cp_768_Fig_2.jpg_) and Mighty Advice (http://www.mightyadvice.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Constant-recording-distance.png)

Don’t forget to maintain a consistent environment! If you’re recording a lot of video lectures and audio narrations, recording in the same place helps keep the audio clear and consistent. An easy way to estimate a proper distance between the narrator and the mic by using The Spreadhand Method – simply use your hand to measure the space between your mouth and the mic. This small tip can make or break the quality of a recording.

That’s a wrap! Following these easy tips will be sure to bring your videos from good to great. Remember, the creator of Star Wars, George Lucas once said “Sound is half the picture.” If Lucas thinks so, having good and clear audio quality must be critical to your online course!

Videos are a great way of creating engaging content for an online course. You might have just finished designing some fantastic materials for your course to ensure your videos are ready to go for students to have the best learning experiences possible. However, even with great visuals and script, students may not be able to enjoy your video to its full quality if the audio is unclear. To ensure students are 100% engaged with the content, here are 5 easy tips on how to record professi... read more

Colour is a cue that gets your audience to see what you want them to see, feel what you want them to feel, and to do what you want them to do. How you use colour also affects the usability – whether people can read your content or not. 

Colour has an impact on how we think and behave. It directs our eye where to look, what to do, and how to interpret something, placing content into context. It helps us decide what is important and what is not. That’s precisely why it is important to keep colour in mind when designing your course banner and thumbnail. 

The Basics Of Colour Theory

Understanding how colour works isn’t just for artists, anyone using content marketing needs to understand the basics of Colour Theory, because you are using colour in your content.

 

Colour can be broken up into 3 groups.

The first is the primary colours, which are the three colours we need to make all other colours. They are red, blue, and yellow. These three colours can be used to create the next level of colours, called the secondary colours.

 

Secondary colours are purple, green, and orange. They are created using the primary colours. If you look on the colour wheel, you’ll find the secondary colors in between two primary colours.

red + blue = purple

blue + yellow = green

red + yellow = orange

 

And lastly the tertiary colours are taking secondary colours one step further. They are the “two-name” colours, such as red-purple, red-orange, yellow-green, etc. They are created by adding more of one primary colour than the other, creating not a true secondary colour but instead, one that is found closer to the primary colour.

 

Now that we have covered the colour basics, here are a few helpful tips on how to use colours for effective communcation.

 

1.Contrast is important when it comes to colour. Contrast is how one colour stands apart from another. It’s what makes text or objects distinguishable from the background. High contrast is when colors easily stand apart from each other. Low contrast is when they don’t. A lack of contrast may be the difference between a great banner and illegible one.

2. Pair your colours well, not all colours look nice together, so it is important to understand their relationships with one another.

 

3. Keep your colour palette simple, using 3 colours works best.

An easy rule to use is ; 60% – dominant colour, 30% – secondary colour, 10% – accent colour

4.  Different colours have different meanings, how we interpret the emotional value of color depends upon our language, senses, and personality characteristics. There are however a few generalized understandings of what specific colours often mean to a large cross-section of people. Knowing some colour meanings is a useful thing to keep in mind when choosing a colour palette for your course.

If you’ve just discovered a new found interest for colours, you can delve a little deeper. There are more colours beyond the colour wheel, if you consider tone, shade and tint the rainbow is endless!

Colour is a cue that gets your audience to see what you want them to see, feel what you want them to feel, and to do what you want them to do. How you use colour also affects the usability – whether people can read your content or not.

Colour has an impact on how we think and behave. It directs our eye where to look, what to do, and how to interpret something, placing content into context. It helps us decide what is important and what is not. That’s precisely why it is important to k... read more

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We are all familiar with the old saying ‘a picture paints a thousand words,’ and in many cases it’s true.  When choosing the right picture to put on your course banner you need to keep in mind what words you want associated with your course.

There is no denying imagery is a very powerful medium (according to range of statistics found here) Some facts:

• People remember 80% of what they see, as opposed to 20% of what they read and 10% of what they hear
• Online articles with images receive 94% more views than articles without images. 

This means making a good impression with your banner will result in a better impression of your overall course. Having an interesting and well-designed banner or thumbnail can make the difference between someone clicking on your course or just scrolling by. The best way to create a stand out banner or thumbnail is through imagery!

One of the key things to remember when working with imagery online is sizing. Your course banner is 2340 x 340px and thumbnail is 600 x 340px. Sizing your images to fit these dimensions correctly is important for ensuring your beautiful design is not stretched or skewed.

The content of your imagery is just as important as the content of your message; you want text and image to work together. Also try to keep the tone of your image consistent with the tone of your message, an often made mistake is the use of cliché imagery which doesn’t match the attitude and character of a course.

One way to ensure that your image is in tune with your course is to create your own imagery. If you don’t have the time or resources to create your own images, stock photos can be a convenient option. Many stock photos can be somewhat cliché, tacky and overused, this may mean not necessarily using the first photo option that pops up.

Here are a few good sites with free stock photos

1. https://500px.com/creativecommons
2. http://albumarium.com
3. http://www.123rf.com/browsefreeimages.php
4. https://www.pexels.com
5. https://plixs.com

If you have found an image that you like, but it still doesn’t quite fit with the tone of your course, don’t be afraid to edit it. A few small adjustments can take a photo from good to great! 

Lastly don’t forget to pair your text and image well, so that the message is both legible and interesting.

With these tips in mind, you can start creating course banners and thumbnails that will be sure to grab your students’ attention! 

Happy designing  :) 

We are all familiar with the old saying ‘a picture paints a thousand words,’ and in many cases it’s true. When choosing the right picture to put on your course banner you need to keep in mind what words you want associated with your course.

There is no denying imagery is a very powerful medium (according to range of statistics found here) Some facts:

• People remember 80% of what they see, as opposed to 20% of what they read and 10% of what they hear
• Online articles with images receive... read more

So you’ve created a course on OpenLearning. You’ve set up each module, wiki page, video, and activity to be interactive and engaging. Now all that’s left is to make sure you really capture students’ attention and get them to join your course. How do you do that?  The answer is relevant, attention-grabbing graphics. 

This blog post will tell you how to use basic graphic design and typography to your benefit in your OpenLearning course.

In your OpenLearning course you can add a customised:

• Course thumbnail, consisting of an image and your course title. This is what your potential students will first interact with. Sized at 600 x 340 pixels.
• Banner image that spans across the top of every page in your course and is 2340 x 340 pixels in dimensions.

A well-designed page, banner, and thumbnail can be the difference between somebody joining your course or just scrolling past it. When used right, the banner and the course thumbnail act as attention-grabbing tools. 

Think of it from your student’s standpoint – they’re browsing the web and scrolling casually, when they come across your course. What’s the first thing they see? Your course name, profile picture, and course thumbnail. When they enter your course, the next thing they see is the banner at the top of the page. This is you making your first impression. 

So make it a good one with a well-designed banner and thumbnail. You probably don’t want to put too much text on either. Do put the name of your course though- people will read this before they read any other information on the page so make sure your course title is catchy and effective.

Here are some quick tips to make your course graphics and pages look great starting with some basic typographic ideas.

1. Try not to use more than two fonts to not overwhelm your message.

2. Choose the right font for your brand. Different fonts have different associations and it is important to pick the right one.

Here is a chart of fonts to help you understand different types fonts

3. Hierarchy is important in your text. Don’t be afraid to use different-sized text, but make sure that that the eye goes to the most important information first. In other words, arrange your text in order of importance. 

4. Use contrast. That is, change the size or weight (bold or light) of your text to emphasise certain aspects.

5. Make sure your text and images work together. If you want to put text over an image, find a clear space where your text wont be invaded by features from the image. Here’s a classic example of text positioning gone wrong.

A good way to think of your banner or course thumbnail image is to think of it like a billboard advertising your brand. This is your chance to grab the attention of passers by and pique their interest, flaunt your brand and give these browsing consumers an incentive to scroll further down. So, just like a billboard, your images should give consumers a taste of who your brand is. The best way to do this is to keep your design consistent with your branding style and tone of voice. 

How do you make your banner and thumbnail consistent with your branding? 

Set a tone for your course, like you would for your brand. Is your course playful, serious, creative, or sophisticated? The tone you set in your course will also depend on your target student audience. 

Once you have established the tone of your course you can begin to create a visual language around this tone. Basically you have three elements to do this: text, images, and colour. Use them well. In the next post we will focus on imagery and how to get the best out of your images. ← show less

So you’ve created a course on OpenLearning. You’ve set up each module, wiki page, video, and activity to be interactive and engaging. Now all that’s left is to make sure you really capture students’ attention and get them to join your course. How do you do that? The answer is relevant, attention-grabbing graphics.

This blog post will tell you how to use basic graphic design and typography to your benefit in your OpenLearning course.

In your OpenLearning course you can add a customise... read more

So you finally have everything set up and you are ready to teach! But hey, wait a second, you need students for that… 

Have no fear - chances are that between your network of people and our platform, you can reach enough people to create a live and rich community of online engaged learner. For FREE!

Here are our 5 top tips for harnessing the power of your existing network of people to help you spread the word about your new and exciting Massive Open Online Course (MOOC).

Tip #1 - Your Course Landing Page Matters!

Before you start showing off your course, take another look at your landing page as this is the one that visitors will see before they decide whether or not to join your course. 

This time think of yourself as someone who searched on Google for this course and clicked on the result that landed you on this page. Would you join (as someone who is passionate about this topic)?

If the answer is YES than you are on the right track.

If you are not sure - Check out this post about creating the best Landing Page for your course

Tip#2 - Get Social

Now that you feel everything is polished and ready to go, it’s time to get your friends, family and social networks to do the work for you.

You probably know more people that you even think of, and they know other people who know other people…

Whether you live on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn or even just in Gmail you probably already have an established group of friends or followers. Get them to help you!

Send them an email/message letting them know you created your first ever online course and invite them to have a look and join if they want to. Don’t forget to ask them to share it!

Post the announcement on your social channels (again, ask for help with getting shares and likes) and follow it up with some news about the course. Do you own a blog? Write about it!

Tip#3 - Encourage Word of Mouth

Who is better to convince people to join your course other than your own students? Why not asking them to help you get the word out about your (awesome) MOOC?

Not sure how? 

1. Send them an email using the email blast tool, asking them to use the share button in the bottom of the course page. 
2. Add a final page/congratulations module in which you can politely ask your students to share the link to the course on their social networks. 
3. You can even think about adding it somewhere along the course explaining to them how more people in this community will make the conversation and learning process better.

Tip#4 - Don't Forget the Real World

That fact that we do almost everything online doesn't mean we don't live in the real world and meet real people!

Try and think where could you meet people that would be interested in your course and how could you let them know about it.

If you are already a teacher/specialist in your topic - you probably already do/go to lectures, talk or attend conferences. Try adding a slide about your course. How about adding it to your business card? You get the idea…

Tip#5 - Taking It to the Next Level

Image Source: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/225373

If you really want to take the time and invest in other marketing channels than the next step would be to find relevant forums/communities/blogs/websites that people go to if they are interested in this specific topic. 

Then all you have to do is to reach out to the website owner and ask for a reference or post your own comment/discussion thread telling the community about your course. Just be careful not to be too spammy! 

Pssst… someone is already doing this job for you…

Just to jump start your course, Openlearning team is working very hard to promote your course on our own channels (if your course is public of course).

Your course would automatically get into the OpenLearning courses index (so people can search for it by keywords or browse our course pages) and we also make sure our 3rd party MOOC indexing websites will be showing your course as well.

If you’ve created a really good course, we would also help with promoting it on our newsletters and top courses lists. Time to start getting your course out to the online (and real) world – good luck! 

P.s. Check our ultimate course landing page cheat sheet for some more tips!  ← show less

So you finally have everything set up and you are ready to teach! But hey, wait a second, you need students for that…

Have no fear - chances are that between your network of people and our platform, you can reach enough people to create a live and rich community of online engaged learner. For FREE!

Here are our 5 top tips for harnessing the power of your existing network of people to help you spread the word about your new and exciting Massive Open Online Course (MOOC).

Tip #1 - Your... read more

Online learning shouldn’t be ‘lonely’ experience. While many people know and don’t like this, very few platforms have been able to solve it. The question then is how has OpenLearning shifted this experience from a lonely to a social experience? The answer is through a focus on community. 

Traditional learning platforms give a sense of a lack of presence or regular activity. They have been built with very little ways to allow students to interact and express their identity, ideas, and opinions. 

OpenLearning, in contrast, has been specifically designed to facilitate student networking by creating in-built sharing tools to encourage group work, self expression, and peer-to-peer interaction that begin to form a safe and positive community. 

Tips to Build A Thriving Social Community on OpenLearning

1. Make full use of OpenLearning’s social media inspired feeds and “micro-interactions” that include features like the ‘like’ button and platform-wide commenting ability. Using these tools as a facilitator to interact with students leads to minimal barriers and maximum encouragement.

A micro-example of a micro-interaction from The Great Poems Series: Unbinding Prometheus

2. Aim to make your OpenLearning course both a meeting place for students with common learning interests (especially in the context of massive open online courses, or MOOCs), as well as an online environment where students can become an engaged member within a community of practice.

3. Build rapport between both learners and teachers, promote social appreciation, and encourage self-expression.

Teacher-student interaction, appreciation, and encouragement - your keys to a happy course community

4. Use the wiki and blogging features to advance the ways in which knowledge sharing, collaboration, self-expression, and personalisation can be used to ensure a vibrant and engaged community within courses.

5. Provide a safe and welcoming space and tone for students to be able to have their own voice. This can be done, specifically, by:

• creating a personal, online identity,
• giving a sense of presence and fellowship,
• promoting a community of sharing,
• facilitating the formation of learning relationships,
• building a user’s reputation within a community,
• fostering collaboration in groups, and
• encouraging meaningful discourse and conversations

How Your Course Activities Can Enhance Interaction In the Community

Online learning systems have traditionally entirely relied on submission drop-boxes or quiz-like assessments. More advanced systems have started to introduce isolated interactive experiences with simulations and virtual environments.

While this is all possible on OpenLearning, the platform takes an additional step of encouraging teachers to create activities that facilitate community interaction. You can incorporate activities that provide interactive collaboration and sharing with the tools provided to keep students immersed and engaged in your courses. 

Sounds too good to be true? Here are some activity ideas to actually make this happen:

• Create/construct and share/exhibit (an activity that encourages self-expression)
  Example: Build something and exhibit it. Experience something and share it
   
• Create/do and then compare, or cluster 
  Example: Build something and then categorise it with things others have built. Discuss pros and cons of each others contributions. Compete, achieve recognition, then help others.
  Note that we refer to competition that fosters an attitude of helping each other to achieve new heights, rather than pitting against each other.
   
• Reciprocal Teaching
  Example: Teach each other something. Let a student teach a topic. 
   
• Discover and Share
  Example: Find something interesting and show it to the rest similar to a show-and-tell.
   
• Crowd Curation, Approval, Feedback & Peer Review
  Example: Decide on favourite examples, praise what's good about what each other has shared.
   
• Append/Extend Discourse
  Example: Write the next part of a story, continue off from where someone else left off.
   
• Contribute/Integrate and combine ideas or collaboratively edit
  Example: Write resources or a textbook together or brainstorm and then compare/filter the ideas.
   
• Pass it on/take a turn
  Example: Find someone to show your thing to, they do something to it, and give it to someone else.
   
• Crowdsource
  Example: Collect people's experiences on an issue/scenario.
   
• Role Play
  Example: Take on a persona, act out a scenario together.

There is no doubt that creating interactive learning activities helps to bring your course community close together.

Create activities to embrace this connectedness and collaboration, rapport and promote dialogue, discovery, exploration, and the sharing of diverse new resources. The whole idea is to make your OpenLearning course a communal online space where the student community aggregates resources and personalises their own learning environment. ← show less

Online learning shouldn’t be ‘lonely’ experience. While many people know and don’t like this, very few platforms have been able to solve it. The question then is how has OpenLearning shifted this experience from a lonely to a social experience? The answer is through a focus on community.

Traditional learning platforms give a sense of a lack of presence or regular activity. They have been built with very little ways to allow students to interact and express their identity, ideas, and ... read more

But rest assured you can still make a great video students will want to watch on a shoestring budget.

Here is a quick guide on how to create an engaging video for your course landing page.

Start with a good script 

While you can create beautiful, perfectly-edited videos  using the most amazing locations, it is more important to get the right message across to your viewers.

For that you need a good script.

Your video script should be first and foremost conversational.  Speak to your students as if they were standing in front of you and not watching you through a computer screen. 

A huge advantage a video can give you in contrast to writing is you are able to be seen, giving you the power of body language, eye contact, and facial expressions. 

When writing your script, a simple way to structure it is by following a who, what, where, when, why, and how layout. Let’s break this down.

Who are you? Always start by introducing yourself, what you do and maybe even a personal fact. 

What is your course about?

Why is the course relevant to your students? This is the key part.

For instance, if your course is about pastry-making, you could say “Learning basic pastry techniques is a necessary skill for any apprentice or home chef who wants to master desserts.” 

How will your course benefit students? Here is where you explain how your course will solve the ‘why’. How will it solve a challenge or fill a gap in their knowledge? This is the take home point you want to students to remember. 

For example, “We will do this by using different techniques, step-by-step videos and tips and tricks from chefs around the globe!”

When will the course begin? Let students know when your course begins and how long it will run for. 

Where is the course taking place? On a global, online platform, you will have students taking your course from around the globe. Let them know which campus or location you are providing your course from. 

Timing is Everything

Most people stop paying attention after a certain amount of time. When creating your video keep it short and sweet. We recommend videos to be between 60-90 seconds to keep people interested! People’s focus will almost always follow a downward slope. This means their focus will be strongest at the beginning of your video. With this in mind, always state your most important points within the first 30 seconds. 

Set the tone

Don’t be afraid to show your passion for your topic in your video! If you don’t seem happy to speak about your course, students won’t be happy joining it either. Excitement is contagious.

Make it Visually Awesome 

Once you have a good, well-timed script it’s time to start making your video visually awesome! Visuals are a very powerful tool and play a big part in setting the tone and feel of your video. Some things to consider:

• Background. Find an open space; standing in a room with a cluttered background can be very distracting. If it is a home-made video, try and find a white or plain coloured wall. If you can’t find a suitable wall or background at home, why not take it outdoors and film in a beautiful park?
• Clothing. Wearing a formal suit will create a very different feel than speaking in a t-shirt and jeans. 
• Using animation or graphics. Sometimes using animation for videos can be very effective. It could also be an alternative if you don’t have a good quality camera for filming. Check out powtoon.com or goanimate.com to create free animated videos. 
• Flow is important. Editing the right parts of your videos helps ensure a smooth flow and removes any unscripted mistakes or awkward long pauses. There are several video editing programs you can use for editing, for instance, After Effects or iMovie (for Mac) or Windows Movie Maker and VSDC Free Video Editor (for Windows). If you have a budget for this video and very little time, you could make use of freelance work websites like Upwork and Fiverr.

Get a Second Opinion 

All great things need to be tried and tested before they become a hit. Ask a friend or colleague to watch your video for a second opinion. Having some objective feedback will confirm whether you are getting the right message and feeling across to students. A little feedback can go a long way! 

Don’t Forget to Invite Students 

This video is designed to get students to join your course, so don’t forget to actually invite them! Finishing your video with a smile and open invitation to click the ‘Join the Course’ button can make the difference between a good and great video.

That’s it – you are now ready to go ahead and work on your video for the course-landing page. Camera rolling in 3, 2, 1…Action!

Ready to start promoting your video? 

For some useful tips on promoting your course, check out The Ultimate Guide For Promoting Your (Awesome) Course. 

But rest assured you can still make a great video students will want to watch on a shoestring budget.

Here is a quick guide on how to create an engaging video for your course landing page.

Start with a good script

While you can create beautiful, perfectly-edited videos using the most amazing locations, it is ... read more

Your course on OpenLearning is customisable in several ways, some ways you may not even realize. Apart from your course content and activities, there is a range of features (specifically left-hand navigation tabs) you can use to help create an engaged and lively community.

Here are some ways you can maximum course engagement and interaction through something as simple as navigation tabs! 

Using the Default Course Navigation Tabs

Creating a brand new course lands you on a page that looks like this:

This is your course Home page.

You look closer and see certain default tabs on the left. 

The one that says Videos & Activities is where you will set up the modules, pages, videos, activities, slides, etc.

The setup and analytic tabs Administer Students and Course Setup at the bottom are viewable only to the teachers and admins of the course.

What about the rest? Let’s see how you can use them.

Course Feed

This page acts like a live feed of comment activity taking place in the course. As a teacher you can use the Course feed to quickly catch up on all activity. Students can use it to see what their peers are liking, sharing, commenting on or what has caught everyone’s attention.

How to Use: You don’t really need to do anything to set it up. The feed works by default.

Peer Content

Think of this space as your class’s pin board where anyone can come and post anything they like. Encouraging students to share as much as they can here, whether it is relevant to the course topic, or not-as-relevant helps spark conversation, peer-to-peer feedback, and students sense of belonging and self expression. 

How to Use: Let students know on the page that they are welcome to share external links, images, videos, or anything else they’d like. Post a couple of things yourself to kick-start interaction on the page.

Groups

This space allows you to create groups among your course community for group projects and submissions. You can even let your students create and facilitate their own study groups according to their own interests.

How to Use: Click on Create New Group on the Groups page. Give the new group a title and description. Make it open for everyone or restrict joining. You can add students to these group and assign them different tasks or projects. Go creative and give these groups cool team names! 

Gallery

The Gallery is exactly what it sounds like. It is a space your students can use to display their work. Take a look at this live example from the course: Introduction to Graphic Design on Canva. 

Student submissions of their final graphic design projects are displayed for course-mates to see, admire, like, and comment on.

It is worth noting that students cannot view others’ submissions in the Gallery before they’ve submitted themselves.

How to Use: Try setting up a Submission activity in your course. It can be Submit a Picture or a Page activity with Sharing settings that allow students to view each others’ submissions. All such submissions are directly displayed in the Gallery. 

Getting Creative With the Course Navigation Tabs

While your course comes equipped with default tabs, all  your tabs are fully customizable! 

All of the above-mentioned tabs are optional and can be modified. See an example of customised and re-arranged left-hand tabs on the left.

1. You can give a different name to a default tab.
   Don’t want to call it the Gallery? Call it the Final Activity Showdown, or anything else you like!
   Videos & Activities not exactly what you want? Call it Course Content, or Stuff That Matters Most – The choice is yours!
    
2. You can add more tabs for other purposes too. Create an easily accessible page with information about other courses that you or your institution have created. Or, create a Q & A Forum where students can discuss any issues they have while doing the course. You can get creative and come up with tabs that may encourage positive or creative thinking. Or, possibly create tab as a type of depositary bank for students to share interesting things from their daily encounters.  

How to use: To change your navigation tab appearance or even to re-arrange the left-hand navigation tabs, go to Course Setup > Appearance > Course Navigation.

The navigation tabs on the left hand are pretty flexible, so don’t be scared to get inspired! Use them to create multiple spaces to spice things up and break the sameness in your course. Diversity is good - it will help promote different threads of discussions, more opportunity for interaction, and lead to better bonds in your course community.

Your course on OpenLearning is customisable in several ways, some ways you may not even realize. Apart from your course content and activities, there is a range of features (specifically left-hand navigation tabs) you can use to help create an engaged and lively community.

Here are some ways you can maximum course engagement and interaction through something as simple as navigation tabs!

Using the Default Course Navigation Tabs

Creating a brand new course lands you on a page that loo... read more