Why Use the Video Essay?

This guide was designed by docutribe™ and Buzz a Bee Productions, LLC (BaBP)* for classroom educators in higher education. It focuses on non-fiction and documentary narrative video essays, and applies to creative, fiction-based narrative projects. It can also be used by any teacher or student as a guide. We hope it serves you well and we welcome your feedback on how to make this site a more effective tool for you as the teacher or student. You can contact Cecily Tyler at cecilytyler [at] gmail.com.

There is a growing disconnect between the multimedia-rich world that students live in and the textbook-based, predominantly analog world where they learn. Most students are digital natives who are used to multimedia in their everyday lives. There is a growing need to connect academia to the realities experienced by communities. In order to make these realities visible, students require empathetic skills, and also observational and listening capabilities.

Using videography as a pedagogical tool bridges this gap well. It has the potential to change how students and faculty relate to information and communication technologies in the digital age. It represents a new diagnostic, hypothesis-generating and problem-solving form of inquiry, and is at our fingertips. It can supplement traditional forms of qualitative and quantitative data collection.

The video essay supports media-capacity building among tomorrow’s experts —whether they are to become doctors, public health officials, policy creators or human rights activists. It can shift the paradigm of storytelling from broadcast (one-to-many) to many-to-many. We no longer need to rely on a monolithic ‘Media’ to share stories of interest. We can devolve tools of media to concerned individuals, immersed deep in the field. Financial and skills-training barriers to video production have dramatically decreased in recent years, making video essays an attractive tool for the classroom.

When learning, students collaborate in methods such as:

Co-creating a research design. Interviewing and reporting on and off camera, and generating new visual, auditory and narrative forms.
Producing content: filming creates an opportunity to learn new levels of engagement and listening skills within multiple, diverse living environments. It helps students learn how to negotiate trust.
Editing: This creates new levels of metacognitive learning, and leads to greater cognition, inquiry and empathy.

How Can a Video Essay Be used?

For Educators and Students, a video essay is...

A tool to help the students discover and diagnose needs in communities with which they work, consult, officiate, support, and/or organize.

For Local Community Leader, a video essay is...

A voice: an opportunity to articulate experiences of living in their community: successes, concerns and suggestions for interventions
A tool that supplements other forms of inquiry

The Purpose of the Video Essay

A videographic essay can be used in academic settings to complement more traditional forms of discovery and diagnosis, like essays, policy memos or presentations. We know that when we integrate multiple forms of analysis and reporting into a process of discovery and diagnosis, deeper learning happens. There is great value to adding an extra learning tool or experience to the classroom. As John Dewey argued, “The learning of public policy and governance cannot take place through forced, textually limiting transmission-based materials like textbooks.” (1916). Learning environments that place students in decision-making positions are particularly valuable for public policy and management students. Designing and creating videographic essays is a valuable addition to the classroom. It is a pedagogical tool that breaks with transmission-based teaching models, and can combine quantitative and qualitative data with discovery and evaluation. It represents an immersive learning environment that provides a unique opportunity for advanced inquiry and learning.

Holland (2014) points out four reasons for studying video in higher education contexts:

First, the way in which current affairs (such as international relations, politics and foreign policy) are reported has evolved in line with new video technology.
Second, students are increasingly recognized as ‘digital natives’, having grown up with these new technologies. (...)
Third, video use is increasing in the classroom, with significant numbers of academics indicating that they expect to make greater use of videos in the future.
Fourth and finally, video use in Politics and International Relations offers the potential to help educators tap into “all of the ways that the human brain learns.”

By applying videographic skills, students gain academic expertise and can become more effective change-agents. Video essays can allow voices of the community to be authentically integrated into teaching, and can lead to more effective solutions, implementation and/or innovation.

An Innovative Audio/Visual Pedagogy: Engaging in media creation challenges “the creators” to become more aware, mindful and thoughtful about what they witness and how they record the information and data. It also requires the student-researcher and the subject in front of the camera to consider who else can be impacted or influenced using their recordings.

After Jorrit de Jong and Cecily Tyler established the Video Essay and the pedagogies that were most effective in its implementation, Alyson Gouden Rock and Cecily worked to outline the rationale and pedagogical backdrop. Alyson’s work can be found HERE.

* While we here at BaBP appreciate accreditation, we are more interested in hearing from you about how we can make the site better, more effective. And, more so, we would love to hear from you about your successes and additional needs when using the tools and teachings offered on our site. Please feel free to contact Cecily at cecilytyler [at] gmail.com.