YouTube is a free video hosting platform owned by Google. It is a useful tool for sharing videos with your class, as well as receiving video presentations from students.
If you have never used YouTube to upload videos before, you can follow the steps below to create a channel, upload videos, and share your videos. The Step-by-Step link in each section will take you to YouTube’s support page for each task.
Create a YouTube channel #
Consider whether you want to make a personal channel (an account tied specifically to the Google account you use to make the channel) or a brand channel (a channel that is not outwardly associated with your Google account – better if you want others to contribute videos and/or manage the account, or if you want to make different channels for different classes).
In an educational setting, a brand channel will be the best choice in most cases.
Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a YouTube Channel
Verify your YouTube account #
Important! You will not be able to upload long videos until you complete this step!
In order to upload videos longer than 15 minutes, you will first need to verify your YouTube account.
Step-by-Step Guide to Verifying your YouTube Channel
Upload videos to YouTube #
You will probably want to set these videos as “Unlisted” so you can link out to them or embed in Canvas, but they won’t be discoverable on Google.
Step-by-Step Guide to Uploading Videos
Clean up auto-captions on YouTube #
YouTube auto-captions go a long way, but they will need a bit of cleanup to ensure accuracy. You will need to wait until the auto-captions generate before cleaning up the captions (unless you want to do it all from scratch). This can take anywhere from an hour to a day or more, depending on how long your video is.
There are lots of guidelines and standards that can be found online for captioning, but they can be overwhelming. If you’re just getting started with captioning, focus on:
- Accuracy – captions should match the spoken words and be spelled correctly
- Punctuation – captions should have proper punctuation and capitalization
- Timing – captions should be timed to match the spoken words as much as possible, but can be adjusted to make sure they are on screen long enough to be read without rushing
Step-by-Step Guide to Editing Captions
Share your video #
Use the “Share” button on your YouTube video to copy or embed a link to your video in Canvas, email, a web page, social media, etc.
Step-by-Step Guide to Sharing Videos
(Optional) Organize your videos in Playlists #
You can create Playlists in YouTube to keep your videos organized. If you have videos for multiple classes all in one YouTube channel, this is a great way to group all videos for one class in the same place. Or, if you have several videos focused on a single unit or subject area, you might also create a playlist for that.
Videos can be in more than one playlist, so feel free to design playlists for whatever purpose works for you. You can even add videos from other people’s YouTube channels to your playlists if you want!
Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Playlists
(Optional) Trim your videos with the YouTube Editor #
If you need to make minor edits (trimming the start/end or removing sections), you can do this after uploading to YouTube with the YouTube Studio Editor. Note that you cannot add or splice in new video or images in the YouTube Editor. If you need to do this, you will need to do so before uploading to YouTube with video editing software like ScreenPal, OpenShot, or iMovie.
Step-by-Step Guide to Using the YouTube Studio Editor
Additional Resources #
For tips on filming a high-quality video, see our Filming Recommendations page.
The Speaking Center has also created resources for both students and faculty on Using Video for Student Presentations.