Effectiveness of interactive video in teaching basic photography skills

Graduation date: 1986The major purpose of this study was to assess the effectiveness of\ud interactive video in the teaching/learning process. More specifically,\ud a comparison was made of the relative effectiveness of interactive\ud video and linear video as delivery modes in the acquisition of basic\ud photography skills in an independent learning environment at a college\ud level.\ud This study employed the largest sample size of any research\ud project to date published on the instructional effectiveness of\ud interactive video (N=128). An experimental pretest to posttest design\ud was used. Students in educational media classes were randomly assigned\ud to interactive video (IV; N=64) and linear video groups (LV; N=64).\ud Analysis of covariance was used to compare achievement of the\ud experimental group with that of the control group.\ud Participants also completed an attitude survey. This form offered\ud insights into students' perceptions concerning the instruction. The\ud written reaction form was measured on a five-point Likert scale, and\ud related to such items as rate of instruction, frustration level,\ud technical problems, and motivation. Significance of between group\ud differences on individual items was tested using the Mann--Whitney U\ud test, and ordinal consensus was measured using a Leik scale.\ud Results indicated that the IV group recorded significantly and\ud consistently larger achievement gains than did the LV group. There was\ud a difference in means between pretest and posttest scores of 29.70\ud (from 49.80 to 79.50) points for the linear group as compared to 35.81\ud (48.94 to 84.75) for the IV group. The average difference of 6.11\ud points in favor of the IV group, is significant at the .001 level\ud (F=10.48).\ud Sixteen of 28 items on the attitude survey had significant\ud differences in group means (p.<.05). Twentyone means favored the IV\ud group. Key attitude differences concerned level of learner control,\ud level of interaction, and preference over traditional methods of\ud instruction. Both groups exhibited a substantial degree of agreement\ud (high consensus level) on most items.\ud Time efficiency was not increased with interactive video. The LV\ud group all took 30 minutes to watch the tape, the LV group's time ranged\ud from 34 minutes to 70 minutes with an average of 49 minutes.\ud All instructional materials were produced expressly for the study\ud by the investigator. This provided the opportunity to document the\ud process involved in planning and producing interactive video materials\ud and permitted an exploration of the instructional design considerations\ud involved. In this study both programs were designed to be nearly\ud identical in content, with differences relating to the attributes of\ud the media rather than the instructor or the approach.\ud Interactive video instruction, if carefully designed and\ud implemented, can be a very powerful and effective method of instruction\ud from the viewpoints of both achievement and attitude