Adventures in Educational Video Design
Part 1: Getting Back into it
This is the first of a series of posts that will look at the process of creating videos to use with my AP Biology classes.
If you really keep up with what I do, you might be aware that I started to roll out a series of course videos for use in my AP Biology class during the summer of 2016. I had designed, filmed, edited, and published videos for the first two major sections of my course (of which there are seven in total) by the end of that summer…at which point I promptly took a new job where I no longer needed to worry about this. During the past two years, I’ve toyed around with finishing this project, but I haven’t ever had the time (time investment for videos is a big one, particularly for my personal working process) or the burning desire. Other things have been more important.
With my return to the classroom in September I’ve found a new source of motivation to continue the project. The addition of the move overseas has caused me to approach the project with newly found haste, at least to a point. The current schedule will have me filming the videos for the next two major sections of my AP Biology course by the end of April. Once these are in the can, I’ll take time over the summer to edit them, and begin uploading them with the start of my school year in mid-August. I’ll also spend the early part of the fall working to develop the media for the last three major sections of my course, with an eye to filming those videos later in the fall. This schedule should allow me to have a full slate of videos for my course on time for students to use them over the course of next year. While the size of this project, the number of moving pieces, and the general nature of existence may all combine to cause me to miss some/all of the deadlines that I have imposed for this project, I am now comfortable enough that I’m going to make the short-term ones that I am willing to talk about it publicly.
Materials creation is one of my favorite things. One of the benefits of getting back into serious materials creation work is that I can share the stuff that I’m making with the larger advanced-level biology teaching communities that I’m a part of. Here’s the first of the new things to come out of this project. I look forward to seeing what else will develop!
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