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A flipped learning approach promotes flexibility, interactivity, and creativity. Video can be an excellent medium for this type of educational environment. Interactive video can engage your students in a flipped learning experience they have never experienced before.

What is Flipped Learning?

The ‘flip’ in flipped learning comes from the idea that learners are centered rather than instructors. Students do not listen to a teacher lecture during time spent in the classroom. Rather, students explore topics actively, participating in discussions, activities, and other parts of the learning culture. Group learning is collaborative and flexible, rather than relying on rigid instruction.

Flipped learning takes place in a flexible environment, where the physical layout of a classroom might change based on subject matter or student’s needs (i.e., group work or independent work). Students have a say in the manner in which they learn. Educators are regularly monitoring and observing in order to make positive adjustments.

The usual passive learning that often has a place in teacher-centered environments takes place at home in a flipped learning environment. Instead of listening to a teacher lecturing, for example, students will take in teacher-provided content at home, in preparation for activities requiring more engagement at school.

Teachers carefully curate or create content in a flipped learning environment. This is where video comes into play!

Using INTERACTIVE Video in Flipped Learning

One of many tools used in flipped learning is video. It’s a popular choice, however, and for good reason. Students who are visual or auditory learners do well with video. Video is often a more approachable, friendly method of sharing information.

Shorter videos are ideal, as are videos that feature simple content. Stick to one video per topic or a similarly logical way to separate information. That doesn’t mean videos have to be boring, of course. Interactivity goes a long way in keeping viewers engaged, rather than sitting back and tuning out the video playing in front of them.

With an interactive video service like InteractiVid, you can take any video and add interactive elements, such as group polls, quizzes, and links to other content, on top of your existing videos. You don’t need to know how to use a video editor or code HTML. Videos stay hosted where they are (like on YouTube), with added analytic tools for you to see how students are engaging with your content. It’s simple to use, recognizing that you’d rather spend your time teaching!

The Benefits of Flipped Learning

Flipped learning is having great results. Many studies show students in flipped learning environments are getting better grades, reporting higher rates of self-perceived knowledge, increasing STEM skills, and experiencing lower stress levels. The benefits to students are clear. For teachers, student success is paramount.

Getting started with flipped learning can be as simple as introducing a few concepts, such as creating an interactive video for students to watch at home and planning for a class discussion after.

Try out InteractiVid, and discover how this technology can change your classroom for the better.

Online learning success has not come as dramatically as some may have expected. Today some still consider a gap exists between online and physical classroom collective learning. However, many schools are finding ways to create a blended learning environment combining characteristics of an online course to the traditional educational experience.

Videos have played a crucial part in narrowing the gap between effective online learning and its traditional counterpart. It is no surprise that videos are the most consumed type of media online today. The flexibility of online coursework for self-motivated students combined with the social interaction of a physical class environment is powerful. But not all video is created equal.

Ineffective Static Videos

Static videos that are embedded straight from YouTube or Vimeo are very common in education. The trouble is students, just like the rest of us humans, have trouble concentrating on most traditional, long lectures. As eLearning Industry puts it,

“The rise of online learning has made education accessible to a wider range of people, but it’s also diluted the interactive component. Oftentimes, instructors will simply post video lectures online. The students can take in the information, but they can’t ask questions. They don’t interact with the teacher or one another.”

Engaging Interactive Video

Introducing interactive videos! It may sound new to some but the reality is interactive video content has been around for a while. Different forms of the technology are starting to make its way into the online classroom but let me give you a specific example:

Let’s take Mr. Jones, a high school Geometry teacher, who has embedded various 10-20 minute YouTube videos on his school’s Learning Management System (LMS) that he likes to use as class prep to introduce lesson material before students come into his class. The major problem Mr. Jones is seeing, however, is that most of his students mark the viewing assignment as “complete” and then in class, it is painfully obvious the majority did not understand or probably even watch the videos. He ends up covering everything the videos had taught in class feeling like the assignments were a waste of time and effort.

How could interactive video help Mr. Jones?

Imagine taking those same educational YouTube videos and overlaying engaging questions and other resource materials to ensure student engagement and understanding. Take one of those 20-minute lecture videos and insert a quiz question that pauses the video after it explains an important point you don’t want your students to miss. Use a poll questionnaire to have students view their peer’s collective answers. Provide a downloadable PDF guide as extra help directly within the video. And as some consider the best part, the system automatically applies a grade based on the student engagement with the videos. How many more students do you think will completely watch and engage with the videos ready for class? We wager over 50% more students will engage with your video content.

Conclusion

Sound like the future? This is only the beginning. The requirement to embrace technology as educators is only becoming stronger. eLearning Industry concludes,

“Educational institutions at all levels -from elementary schools to universities- are often criticized for being behind the times when it comes to technology. Even the youngest students are now tech-savvy. To effectively teach, educators must embrace popular technology to make online learning live up to the hype.”

Check out our interactive education video example here

You may be like many companies or individuals who decided to make some videos for your website because an expert said so or now just about every website contains some sort of video media. Statistics from the likes of Hubspot only add to the growing urgency:

A third of all the time people spend online is dedicated to watching videos

and

90% of customers report that product videos help them make purchasing decisions

The expectation for video content is real but making videos without a real purpose or goal can be just as bad or worse than having no video at all. And the truth is making these videos interactive doesn’t solve the problem either.

Let’s explore determining the purpose of your videos. But first, an example:

Imagine I’m browsing the website of a product I’m considering purchasing. With my credit card number ready, I visit the product webpage only to find a brief description and a series of long, how-to-setup tutorial videos. It really doesn’t inspire me to purchase. In fact, I leave the website searching elsewhere to spend my money.

This happens all the time. How much more effective would it be to have the first thing I see, when loading the product page, be a 1-2 minute video illustrating the most compelling benefits of current product users. I tell you it would have made it 10 times easier for me to decide to buy it right there.

Now I am not saying the tutorial videos were poorly written or produced. I am suggesting the purpose of my visiting that particular webpage was to consider buying the product right at that moment! Not learn how to set it up for the 10+ minutes. You need to know why people are coming to your website or viewing your video.

So, that leads us to the 3 steps to more purposeful videos.

The 3 Steps

First, determine who your intended audience is and what you want your video(s) to do for them. What is the end goal? Are there various steps to reaching that goal? Are they going to purchase something right out of the gates? Or will they more likely be willing to do something else first like signing up for a newsletter? Well-positioned videos can guide your viewers to act in the order that best reaches your end goal.

If you want to introduce people to your brand or product, consider an explainer or introduction video. If you want to educate them about a problem you help solve consider an instructional video or tutorial. Once you determine the purpose of your video you can start to guide their experience the next two steps flow much easier.

Second, decide what action(s) the viewer will want to take during or after your video(s). Once you have determined the video’s purpose this is pretty easy.  Make these desired actions into what are known as Call-to-Actions. If you have an explainer video that introduces your product or brand, invite the viewer to test and/or purchase the product. If it is an educational video provide the viewer materials to download or invite them to view related videos.

Third, develop and experiment positioning your calls-to-action at various times in your videos. This is the fun part and easy to do using InteractiVid which allows you to overlay interactive objects on top of your existing video. These are customizable with its interactive element positioning slider. Wherever you position the slider all your embedded versions of the video are automatically updated. No republishing necessary! Some elements allow you to choose the duration or length that the element will appear onscreen. Play with different combinations of positioning and length to get the results you want. And finally, use the built-in analytics to see historical data and compare results over time.

Conclusion

In conclusion, videos don’t need to cost tens of thousands of dollars to be effective.  And not every video you make needs to rake in millions of views or become “viral” to reach your goals. Just take some time to plan your end goals and start drafting some videos with that purpose in mind. With some simple calls-to-action and a little help from an interactive video service, your video can be just as effective as your favorite multi-million dollar brands!

If you are not using video online then you probably haven’t been on the internet much and should take a look at some statistics before continuing. Video is dominating web content. “90% of online consumers report that a business’ product or service video helps them make a decision to buy.”

So, we all know video content is important for any business’ online presence and everyone should be doing it, right? Yes, but understanding your overall marketing strategy and how video can help fulfill your goals is just as important.

Interactive Video Can Help

You may already have some explainer videos on your landing pages gathering plenty of views. Hopefully, your video informs your visitors about your organization or product. You hopefully also have a call to action on your landing page and, even better, in your video. Interactive video can help. But I am sure you also have videos that may not have a clear call-to-action or weren’t originally intended for a marketing purpose. Interactive video can help here too.

Consider this example: You recently hosted a live webinar to generate new leads and want to post the video recording of the webinar on your website. You had a couple calls-to-action inviting viewers to register for a trial of your product throughout the webinar. The problem is all the live interaction was conducted by your webinar broadcasting service (e.g., WebEx, GoToWebinar, etc.). Using an interactive video service allows you to add elements like a conversion form, download file button, quiz or poll over your webinar video recording.

You might be saying: “What if I already have a solid explainer video on my landing page with an effective call-to-action?” I’ll answer that with another question: Why not integrate an in-video clickable call-to-action button to make it that much easier for viewers to act?

Interactive elements like quizzes and polls can also help you gather useful data about your potential customers. For example: I have a video about making explainer videos. I want to know how many explainer videos viewers produce per year. I can have a poll appear directly inside the existing video. No separate survey in a follow-up email or list of questions to ask in the first phone call. Just a quick multiple choice poll integrated wherever you want in the video.

Conclusion

Why make your videos interactive? An interactive video service can overlay elements on top of your existing videos. Elements like download buttons or conversion forms turn your static recordings into a self-propelled, lead generating machine.