Cost-Effective Creation of In-House Instructional Videos

The millennium generation has arrived at law school.  With their arrival comes the need to create new instructional materials to correspond with their unique learning styles.  However, their arrival coincides with a period of stagnant or even shrinking law school budgets.  This created a dilemma:  “How can we meet the needs of a new generation of learners with limited resources?”

Elon University School of Law has turned to in-house production of instructional videos in an attempt to meet these instructional needs.  To date, we have worked specifically in the areas of Bluebook citation and legal research; however, same production methods can be used to meet the video centric learning styles of this latest generation of law students across the curriculum.

This program will examine:

• The educational theory behind our format choice
• Criteria used to in making our final software choices
  • Significant focus on the cost and level of technological expertise required for each program considered
  • Our final production choices:  Powerpoint, Audacity and Camtasia
• The production process we settled-on for the creation of short instructional videos  
• Lessons learned  for making process easier and less stressful

The presenters have hands on experience with the project and production process and include:

Benjamin McFadyen , Academic Technology Consultant for Elon University, partners with instructors to explore how technology can be used to enhance student learning and provide efficient, effective ways to achieve pedagogical goals.  He holds a BA in Communications and M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction, Educational Media from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is currently a doctoral student at University of North Carolina at Greensboro in Educational Studies and Information Systems.

Kathleen McLeod, Associate Dean for Library and Information Systems at Elon University School of Law, teaches basic and advanced legal research courses at Elon.  She holds an A.B. from Syracuse University, a J.D. from Washington University in St. Louis and a M.L.S. from Southern Connecticut State University.

Patricia Perkins , Assistant Professor of  Legal Writing at Elon University School of Law,  teaches courses in legal method and communication,  law and leadership, andprisoners’ rights at Elon.  She holds a B.A. from Davidson College and a J.D. from Vanderbilt University School of Law.