Video, defined in this paper as a medium that supports both moving pictures and sound (Shepard 2003), has had a significant presence in higher education for many decades. In recent years, however, use of video and awareness of the possibilities associated with video in higher education have expanded dramatically (Tiernan and Gurrin 2012). Students are increasingly using video in presentations and other assessment tasks and are increasingly creating video resources for their courses and peers (Kirkwood 2010; Sherer and Shea 2011). Assignments are being set that involve the collection and archiving of video content (Sherer and Shea 2011). Synchronous video-communication platforms are offering new means of teacher-student and student-student interaction (Smyth 2011). Several academic media centers are being reconfigured to enable increased video development as well as access (Vallier 2010). And increasingly, videos are being produced by academic language and learning units to support student learning, some Australian examples being Victoria University’s Student Learning Online site, The University of Melbourne’s Academic Interactive Resources portal, and the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology’s International Student Stories site.

More courses featuring video are appearing online, and free, standalone, open-access videos are readily accessible (Mitra et al. 2010). Institutions such as Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology offer particularly prominent examples of how video can augment traditional delivery, support distance learning on a mass scale and replace traditional teaching venues and practices. Videos produced by institutions such as the Khan Academy, whose stated mission is to change “education for the better by providing a free world-class education for anyone anywhere” (Khan Academy 2014, n.p.) are gaining enormous popularity and academic interest. Furthermore, easily accessible online media channels and online communities for sharing instructional videos such as YouTube, Google Video, iTunes U, and TeacherTube offer students and staff an enormous variety of videos that can be used for teaching and learning purposes.

The increasing availability of video editing apps has furthermore contributed to an upsurge of student media production, including mashups of existing video content and the creation of short videos that investigate particular topics. In line with this trend, some universities are providing students significantly greater support and resources for work on digital media projects (Vallier 2010).

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