Session: 09-08-01: Distance/Online Engineering Education, Models and Enabling Technologies

Paper Number: 70559

Start Time: Tuesday, 10:15 AM

70559 - Increasing Demand of Online Audio-Visual Engineering Knowledge in Students: A Case Study 

For centuries our knowledge was preserved in the form of books, i. e. written form. To this day, most of the new research in engineering is published in journal papers which is in the form of text. But due to technological advances, audio-visual storage of knowledge is now possible. A large number of journals are supporting the publication of supplementary videos along with journal papers. Also, the huge demand for educational videos in the field of mechanical engineering is increasing more than ever. As videos create a more engaging sensory experience in comparison to text, students find it much easier to understand and process the information gained through videos. Support of 3D animation can simplify the things which are rather difficult to explain with the help of 2D drawings. The use of educational videos is not only beneficial to students but also to teachers and their institutes. Repeatability of the same video reduces the teacher's efforts exponentially in the long run. In this era of the internet, it is also very easy for a video to reach a global audience using available commercial video streaming platforms. Powerful search engines like Google, make it easier to find such educational content at student’s fingertips. On top of that, the recent event of pandemic further increased the use of online teaching in the form of videos. Many courses were forced to use online platforms and teachers were encouraged to make audio-visual content. There is a high chance these changes are here to stay for a long time.

This study analyses the advantages and disadvantages of using educational videos in the mechanical engineering field. A glance at the history of the use of videos in engineering education and what the future looks like in this field especially due to the aftermath of Covid19. This talk lays out the elements to be included in educational videos to make them more engaging and appealing to the students. It also talks about precautions teachers/professors should take while creating the content. A case study is performed to understand the effect of different parameters on the reach of educational videos to the global audience using the video streaming platform YouTube. A relation between YouTube’s statistical data regarding the performance of educational video and basic blocks of educational video creation is established. A large number of data set are used to create this relationship. 

Keywords: Online education, educational videos, mechanical engineering, Covid19 aftermath. 

Presenting Author: Shank Kulkarni Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Authors:

Shank Kulkarni Pacific Northwest National Laboratory