What Is the Future of Video in EdTech?

By necessity, teachers and students turned to video in all its forms—synchronous, asynchronous, and interactive—to support remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The EdTech companies who enabled this trend might wonder: did the need for video accelerate an existing trend, or will video drop to near pre-pandemic usage as students return to classrooms? If video is here to stay, what will its role be?

Many learners already prefer video. More than half of students in 6th through 12th grades say they learn more from videos than from books. In addition, students can use video to make up missed lessons, reinforce knowledge, learn and take notes at their own speed, and study for tests. In one survey, 88% of students rewatched screencast recordings of lessons, and more than half rewatched the videos twice or more.

To get a better sense of the future role of video in education, we asked educators and EdTech professionals to share their thoughts. Here are the key takeaways:

• Educators embrace video-based learning
• Video benefits both remote and in-person learners
• The ability to rewatch lessons offers better results
• Video improves access to education

Educators embrace video-based learning

During the pandemic, video production for education pivoted from professionally produced content to more raw classroom-generated video, according to TJ Hoffman, COO of Sibme.

The pandemic, coupled with widespread adoption of new technologies like Zoom, [Microsoft] Teams, and recorded video from mobile and laptop cameras, has made user-created video content much more ubiquitous in schools. Teachers and students are much more comfortable being on video, and video sharing platforms that specialize in secure video-sharing have become more widely adopted. As classrooms reopen, the use of user-created content in learning will help teachers differentiate and individualize learning, creating more dynamic classrooms that allow students to learn at their own pace: the gold standard in pedagogical circles.

TJ Hoffman, COO of Sibme

Video benefits both remote and in-person learners

While the circumstances of COVID-19 necessitated a transition to remote, video-based learning, Dhonam Pemba, CEO and co-founder of KidX AI, suggested that video will continue to be used to supplement lessons when students are back in the classroom.

Now that education is returning to school, the future of video in EdTech would blend offline instruction with online practice. Previously, online technology to supplement offline education had a long way to go from being customizable and easily adopted. The supplemental video was from generic sources that weren’t customized to the lessons actually taught in school. With improved remote learning tools and interactive video solutions, educators are more easily able to create and deliver video content. Teachers are now able to supplement in-school lessons with interactive videos for practice at home.

Dhonam Pemba, PhD, CEO and Co-founder of KidX AI

The ability to rewatch lessons creates better results

Educators are likely to keep some of the methods used during remote learning as part of a hybrid teaching format, according to Eric Kim, Co-owner and Program Director at LA Tutors. He added:

For students who may not feel comfortable asking questions in front of their peers, or simply need to pause instruction to review a concept in a little more detail before moving on, the option to rewatch instruction is priceless. I imagine that recorded lectures and video demonstrations will take on a larger role in the future. Independent schools with bigger budgets will likely invest in high production value video options, giving students and teachers additional resources that can be used in a variety of ways.

Eric Kim, Co-owner and Program Director, LA Tutors

Video improves access to education

Zafer Elcik, CEO & Co-Founder of Otsimo, says remote learning created a need for educational video solutions—particularly for special education. "In our industry, families suddenly lost their access to in-person special education services, which are crucial for the children’s development. So, the pandemic hit these families, an already underserved demographic, very hard." Elcik adds:

As the pandemic so vigorously showed, access to education is one of the most important issues we need to solve, especially for the special education niche. Research has proven utilizing video in EdTech is a great way to do it and from here we can only go upwards.

Zafer Elcik, CEO & Co-Founder of Otsimo

Thoughts from Our Advisors: Future Market Dynamics related to Video in EdTech

It’s still too early to tell who will dominate the EdTech market. Despite the entrance of mega vendors like Microsoft, Google, and Apple into the space, education is largely an underserved market and we expect to see immense growth in this area for both platforms and point solutions to solve acute challenges as the market continues to evolve.

As we enter a new normal for remote and hybrid education, new point solutions for EdTech video will likely crop up to fulfill niche use cases that are not currently met by the larger players in the space. As more parties enter the EdTech video market, fragmentation will create pressure to consolidate. This pressure will drive strategic buyers to acquire and further integrate video into their platforms.