YouTube Annotations
YouTube allows for annotations that are clickable text overlays on YouTube videos. These annotations can increase engagement with videos, give more information, and aid in navigating longer presentations.
- Ask a specific question to enhance viewer engagement.
- Create a table of contents for long-form videos.
- Make areas of your video clickable and interactive.
- Insert questions throughout a video to help promote understanding and to keep them engaged for the duration of the video.
- Segment a long video into chapters so that students can jump to particular sections they want to review or skip content they are familiar with.
Pros
- Free!
- Unique feature calls spotlight annotations. “Spotlight annotations stand out because they allow creators to subtly create clickable areas within a video. The text only appears when a viewer hovers over it with the mouse; a light outline shows when the viewer’s not hovering. This is a great way to include unobtrusive but clickable annotations.
Cons
- You will probably need to password protect your video and/or channel to avoid unwanted comments.
- You will not have the same gradebook and education-related supports that HapYak and VoiceThread provide.