Both are sure to become ever-more pervasive as the industry evolves to reflect the wider digital world. For instance, people increasingly opt for online video tutorials instead of reading manuals and books, or a video summary of the headlines instead of flicking through a newspaper. Such changing behaviour patterns will of course manifest in learners’ expectations of digital learning.
Videos are often best kept short so that the learner doesn’t have too much information to take on, and they can be a great vehicle for storytelling. For example, a character in a video could speak about a problem they’ve faced, and the learner could then evaluate how best to resolve the situation. The learner is able to empathise with the personified character, which will in turn help them to remember the content and the lesson learned.
Animation can be used in all kinds of ways. Visual cues grab the learners’ attention, so it can be great for delivering on-screen instructions. It can also be used in a similar way to video – to tell a story – yet with the added bonus of enabling characters’ features to be chosen specifically to suit the project. It also allows for greater scope in terms of scripting, which is not always the case with video, especially when spontaneous responses have been captured.
