How Instructor-Developed Screencasts Benefit College Students’ Learning of Maths: Insights from an Irish Case Study

This qualitative case study explored how students learning Maths at an Irishinstitute of higher education benefited from their instructor’s use of selfdevelopedscreencasts. The screencasts (47 in total) were posted on theinstitute’s Maths Moodle site for students to access. One hundred and thirty-eight(n = 138) students participated in an online open-response survey. Students’commentary was analyzed using thematic content analysis (TCA). Themes thatrepresented different types of screencast benefit to students were generatedfrom the data. Consistent with previous studies, the findings show that a vastmajority of students (88.4%) used the screencasts for many different purposes andviewed the videos as an extremely useful tool that enhanced their Maths learningexperience. Ten primary benefits of screencasts emerged, namely allowingflexible and personalized learning, supplementing lectures and enhancingunderstanding of Maths keyskills, facilitating exam revision and material review,providing multimodal support for Maths learning, helping students to keep trackwith the Maths modules, providing a tighter match with course content, deliveringa vicarious learning experience, serving as a memory aid, filling in gaps in classnotes, and making Maths more enjoyable. The findings support the use ofscreencasts in facilitating and enhancing students’ learning of Maths in highereducation.