Guidelines for effective online instruction using multimedia screencasts

This paper aims to present guidelines for using streaming multimedia tutorials in academic library instruction.

Research in cognitive psychology, education and librarianship is synthesized and its application to the design of library screencast or multimedia tutorials is discussed.

Guidelines are presented on determining when multimedia is needed, how to make sure multimedia tutorials are clear and understandable, how to include interactivity effectively, how to promote critical thinking, and how to design interfaces and tutorial structure based on levels of student knowledge.

Screencasts are a relatively new form of library instruction. Guidelines in this paper are summarized in a checklist that can be used when designing screencasts or multimedia tutorials.