In the modern corporate world, everyone is looking for growth. To enable said growth, big and small firms strategically invest in tools for boosting learning and development. These tools may include learning management systems (LMSs), video content management systems, training material production tools, and other online learning systems.
Many learning and development leaders have revealed another secret weapon for increasing the effectiveness of staff training: online video training combined with micro-learning.
Videos are now a common method for most companies to train their employees. L&D teams write, record, produce, and edit videos on their course subject, then distribute them among employees based on their training level and type.
Scripting is always the most crucial part of this entire process, no matter how good your editing and animation team is or how confident your Subject Matter Expert (SME) is. You need a properly planned script for your video because:
- It saves time and expense during the filming and editing process.
- It helps avoid communication gaps between on-camera SMEs, you, and the animators.
- It streamlines your educational content.
Therefore, whenever you plan to make a video for your microlearning course, start by scripting and sorting all your video components before investing in heavy resources for production.
But, coming to the basics, what is microlearning? Let’s find out.
What Is Micro-Learning?
Micro-learning reduces our training content to very short, easily digestible chunks (usually lasting 30 seconds to a few minutes), addressing a particular learning aim.
Micro-learning events in our daily life typically go unnoticed. Whether you are viewing a lesson on how to cut a pineapple or finding a statistic on Google to settle a dinner table disagreement, all of these snippets in our routine technically count for micro-learning. Consequently, as we further integrate micro-learning into our daily lives, we will eventually expect access to it during more formal pursuits of knowledge.
According to Freeman, micro-learning has lots of important applications in the modern workforce, where individuals are expected to continuously absorb new material to stay updated from time to time. Given the rapid speed at which the modern workplace is evolving, traditional learning experiences, such as textbooks, lengthy lectures, and even PowerPoint presentations and PDFs, are frequently considered prohibitively time-consuming and static.
Micro-learning in the form of videos, as a result, is gaining popularity. You can consider making micro-learning video content to suit changing training and development needs for a variety of reasons, including:
- Recording and updating information is quick: Micro-learning videos can be made relatively quickly and effortlessly. If the information changes, you can update the content with little effort.
- Knowledge can be accessed whenever and wherever you want: With a searchable video collection or corporate YouTube channel, it is simple to locate micro-learning modules on specific subjects, allowing employees to access and apply knowledge on demand.
- More efficient learning: Small chunks of knowledge with a narrow focus are easier to consume and assimilate than lengthy training sessions or text-heavy eLearning content.
Steps To Create A Script For A Micro-Learning Video
1. Write A Small Brief
Writing a script for a micro-learning video is best started with a creative brief. A brief guarantees you and everyone else involved in the project understand the needs of your learners and adhere to your organization’s learning framework or your learning objective. In fact, you should consider this compass for all eLearning courses that you design.
This brief or summary will provide an overview of the video course’s direction. Spend considerable time on this step, as the entire course hinges on the brief. In this approach, you are not producing a script from scratch but rather utilizing a structure that keeps you on-topic.
You can start with questions like:
- Who is my audience?
- What would my audience like to learn?
- What takeaways do I want them to have through this course?
2. Interview Your Subject Matter Expert
Sit down with a subject matter expert (SME) once you have a blueprint of the course’s direction and structure. This is vital to ensuring that your eLearning video script is relevant and will result in real-world behavior change among your learners.
You can find the answers to these questions with your SME:
- What are the behaviors that learners want to change, and how? Are there specific barriers to it?
- What role can you play in helping them change this behavior?
- What information will the learners need for behavior change?
You should spend at least two hours with your Subject Matter Expert. Use backward design to guarantee that your micro-learning script meets the demands of users.
3. Start Writing The Script
The next step is to start writing the script. Don’t get tied up on finding the ideal phrase; simply pen down the material lingering around in your thoughts and then polish it. It does not have to be perfect in the first go because your script will undergo multiple revisions.
The introduction is the most difficult aspect of any script. It must contain a hook that keeps the learners motivated to stick around and pay attention till the end of the video. Therefore, if you are unsure how you can begin with a solid introduction, leave it till the end. Instead of beginning with the introduction, work on the main content first. This ensures that your introduction touches on all course subjects and accurately describes what the learners will encounter.
4. Add Required Markers
Do not try to finish this off like an academic project. Your script is a guide for your performers, voiceover artists, animators, instructional designers, and others.
It is essential to provide comments in micro-learning scripting. These annotations indicate when narration is required and what it contains. It will help your organization get mileage out of its talent resources and streamline your eLearning messaging.
Although you do not need to plan out your complete storyboard at this time, it is helpful to consider which scenes and images you would like to include in your final output. What will you need to portray on-screen? What must be conveyed to your audience through visuals?
5. Read It Out Loud
When writing for a video, the primary distinction is that you must hear how the content will sound to your audience. Sentences may sound great on paper, but when spoken aloud, they may be difficult to comprehend.
Write material that sounds nice as opposed to something that looks well when read. Record yourself reciting the script loudly. Repeatedly replay the audio and revise the script as you listen.
Also, if you’re trying to adhere to a strict time limit, examine the length of the script at this stage. Use the following lengths as guidelines when composing the script:
- 100 words for 45 seconds
- 150 words for 1 minute
- 190 words for 1:30 minutes
6. Get Feedback
Finally, get some input from your team. Nothing is flawless in its initial form. Share the script draft with your team to determine which elements require revision, which ones are the strengths, and which ones will be good with only a few tweaks.
It is beneficial to have a third party review your script. This will help you evaluate the content’s flow, grammar, correctness, and general quality. The more enhancements you make, the fewer adjustments you will have to make while recording audio, producing animations, or filming live-action scenes. Adjustments made during the scriptwriting phase can save time and effort.
Conclusion
Micro-learning fits well in most learning setups since it only takes the attention of the learners for only a little while but helps them retain knowledge. By following these six steps, you can create a script for your micro-learning course that will efficiently pass on the information to your learners.