Poster Track: Creative Approaches & Student Engagement
Poster Description: This poster will explore how peer instruction models were used to develop a series of unscripted, conversational video tutorials where students serve as the primary instructors and narrators of instructional videos, guided by a librarian’s questions. This approach enhances engagement and reduces anxiety, by highlighting supportive librarian-student relationships.
Poster: Video poster is embedded below. Click here to view poster on YouTube in a separate tab. Click here to view the descriptive transcript in a separate tab.
Presenter Name(s): Rebecca Nowicki
Presenter Bio(s): Online Learning Librarian Rebecca Nowicki leads San Diego State University Library’s online instruction program. She designs learning objects that foster active engagement and meet students and faculty at their point of need to empower information literate learners that are adaptable to the changing information landscape of the 21st Century.
14 replies on “Conversations with Students: Creating Engaging Instructional Videos Using Peer-to-Peer Instruction and a Conversational Model”
Warning audio is sped up for time. Here is a link to the slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rZYoITvNfY7UMD73dm1FBUYURAqv_ukl/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=100291842362091458834&rtpof=true&sd=true.
Try watching it at .80 speed if it is too fast for you.
Warning: audio is sped up for time. Here is a link to the slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rZYoITvNfY7UMD73dm1FBUYURAqv_ukl/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=100291842362091458834&rtpof=true&sd=true.
I’m considering revamping some instruction videos for my library and this is such a creative and engaging idea! What kind of feedback have you received from students or faculty who have watched the videos? Also, start to finish, roughly how long would you say it took to create one video?
It depends. Sometimes I sit down with a student and we discuss a variety of topics so I can make multiple videos. I am the liaison to tow bigger schools and in spring I teach a 3 credit seminar, so I often edit when I can and in fits and starts. Saying that, if I have time I can turn a video in about 2 to 5 days depending on the length and what I want to add to the visuals (and how many meetings I have). I take a couple of passes at editing the audio and while editing that plan out the video that will accompany it .
I forgot your question about the feedback. Students have told me they love it. They like hearing from each other. The students that record with me get excited about participating and hearing themselves and showing others. I want to add assessment to them, that is the next step. I just added a poll to YouTube, but my guess is it will not get a lot of responses. I am in the process of developing a study for Fall to get formal feedback.
That’s helpful to know that sometimes you’ll discuss a few different topics with a student in one conversation. I’m sure it makes it easier to produce the videos with everyone’s busy schedules. Thanks for sharing the feedback you’ve gotten. It’s great that students have been enjoying the videos. I’ll keep an eye out for your future study!
Such a great idea, Rebecca! How do you identify or students self-identify their interest in helping with this project? Also, beyond the podcasting space & mic, what editing software and other technology are you using to create and produce these videos?
Great questions. These are all student workers. I worked with all of these students at the research desk or in another capacity. I asked if they were interested in being involved and it becomes part of their hours. The audio recording takes less than an hour because there is no script. (My first draft of this video poster included this but a lot of content I cut out for time.) For the audio and video I use Camtasia. It has a lot of features that allow me creativity and flexibility for adding visuals and editing the audio.
Such a great idea, Rebecca! How do you identify or students self-identify their interest in helping with this project? Also, beyond the podcasting space & mic, what editing software and other technology are you using to create and produce these videos?
Rebecca, thanks for sharing! This is such a neat idea! How does your library market the “Conversations with Students” series to your patrons?
I do have a Learn Research Techniques from SDSU Students Libguide (https://libguides.sdsu.edu/ConversationsWstudents) that is listed in on the Tutorials & How-Tos : Learn to be a a better researcher page(https://libguides.sdsu.edu/learn), but that is it right now. We haven’t promoted them as a series yet because I wanted to get a larger set of videos before we started highlighting the series.
There has been some promotion. The project started in 2018 with the first video posting on Jan 28, 2019, that was promoted on the library website and on digital signs across library. This was how the individual videos have all been promoted.
I did have to put the idea on hold because I was new to the position and it had been over 2 years since anyone was working on online instruction, so had to focus on a few other projects that were a priority. I did try to restart it in 2020 and I had recorded a good set of audio on a variety of topics in March of 2020 to continue, but the audio got corrupted in a software update and with the Covid lockdown we could not rerecord them. I tried several techniques to restart during lockdown, but the recordings either had bad sound quality, or were too complicated to edit. We returned in September 2023, and I was not able to restart until then.
Future plans: I have three other videos in the editing stage that I hope to complete for Fall: Where do you start?; Help! I Can’t Find Any Sources; & How to Use One Source to Find Others. I also plan on chopping up the Website Tour into a shorter videos. I reached out to our marketing folks and we are planning to promote the series in Fall.
Sorry for the long winded reply.
No problem! I appreciate your overview of the background–it helps put your promotion in perspective. I’m always interested in learning about how other librarians promote their resources and services to students because it’s something I am attempting to improve upon in my current role. It sounds like you have a great plan in place!