Anchorage School District Trains Teachers via Mediasite Webcasts

During a study of over 40 million five-minute videos, Visible Measures found that within the first 10 seconds, 20% of the audience left. By 30 seconds 33% were gone and at the one minute mark a full 44% had moved on. 

That means you better grab your audience quickly. But at Anchorage School District, where video training via Mediasite was running fast and furious, there was no time to stop and train the teachers how to create an engaging webcast that would keep viewers past that critical one-minute mark. 

“We were running as quickly as possible just to keep up with the demand for recording. And though from the onset I wanted to address the content of the video I just didn’t have the time,” said Cheryl Johnson, technical production coordinator, Anchorage School District. “Soon it became apparent that the issue could no longer be ignored. If our audience was going to grow, return and explore videos they weren’t required to watch, we were going to have to do something about the content, the structure and the look of our presentations.”

Last spring Cheryl’s team of two started working with presenters on creating riveting webcasts.

“If they wanted viewers to gain a true understanding of their topic they would have to shake things up a little,” she said.

They designed a workshop based on the most recent information available about how people retain information. They also incorporated proven presentation techniques and put it all together using the principles of backwards design. 

“Using this technique we were able to pare down the information to make it efficient for the instructors’ time, yet still ensure they were getting the most important information,” she said.

The team offered a two-part workshop to walk through the process. Part one was a brainstorming session on how to best structure their topic. Part two focused on adding visual elements and exploring the options available for recording, including rich media, slides with voiceover, video only or screen capture. 

They focused on using images, music, lighting and colors to support their main topics, and how to think of their presentation as a complete visual package. And so far Cheryl believes that the presenters are heading in the right direction. 

“Making the training available is only half the battle,” she said. “Making the content more efficient will get them to come back and see what else we have to offer.”