Evaluating the digital manuscript functionality - User testing for lecture video annotation features

Abstract

In current tele-teaching platforms the main challenges for learners are searching and filtering through the content and staying focused on learning with the help of the e-lectures. Video annotation and video indexing features may provide support for learners in this situation. In this paper we will introduce one solution for a lecture video annotation feature called the digital manuscript. Digital notes can be written synchronously or asynchronously to the time of the actual lecture. Different features such as instant time markers and formatting options are available. In order to prove our hypothesis that the digital manuscript feature enables students to better concentrate on watching the video lecture and thus results in an improved learning effectiveness, we conducted a user study. The results include insights into the perceived usefulness of the annotation functionality as well as a quantitative comparison of assessment results with and without the manuscript feature and the indexing features as comparison. An outlook to group functionalities as well as a semantic extension of the video annotation feature is finally given. © 2013 Springer-Verlag.