Thematic video

Initial situation

For several years, the “Corporate Groups and Restructuring” course was organized around oral presentations made by students in small groups. Each group gave 3 to 4 presentations during the semester, which allowed students to integrate the feedback received at the end of each presentation and to implement it in the next presentation.

Despite the good level of the presentations, there was a certain lack of enthusiasm and commitment among the students when it came to listening to their colleagues. The question was how to motivate students to be more involved in the presentations of other groups.

Project implementation

To involve the students more during the viewing of the other groups’ work, the idea was to draw inspiration from hip-hop battles. In these dance competitions, 2 teams battle each other by alternating on the dance floor. At the end, the spectators vote for the team with the best performance.

To implement this idea in the course, the students form groups (about 5 students). Each group has to produce 2 videos of 10-15 minutes duration on the subject “corporate groups” (e.g. “group concept”, “creditor protection”), and 2 videos on the subject “restructurings” (e.g. “numerus clausus of restructurings”, “worker protection”). Each of the themes proposed to the students is treated by 2 different groups.

During the video production phase, the teacher meets regularly with the students of each group (2x/week at the beginning) to exchange on the research, ideas and structure of the videos.

At the end of this phase, 2 plenary sessions take place during which all the videos are viewed. This is an opportunity for the students (authors or not) to compare the videos dealing with the same theme. At the same time, the authors of the videos can benefit from informal feedback from their peers on the work done.

For the evaluation, the teaching team considers the group work for the making of the videos, a short individual presentation on a subject imposed to the students and a theoretical question to be developed on the videos of the other groups.

These two elements, video comparisons and questions on the content of the videos, are intended to involve the students as much as possible during the viewing sessions.

Thoughts and advice

On the technical level (recording videos), no training was necessary for the students, who generally make good videos mainly with their smartphones and laptops.

Regarding the content, although the groups dealing with the same themes do not coordinate, the themes - which are broad enough - are generally treated differently by the groups not only in form, but also in content, since each group puts different emphases on “its” topic. This results in videos that are complementary or present the material from different angles, which is certainly an asset for the understanding of the topics covered.

The whole structure of the course, around the making of the video, gives the teacher the possibility to follow the process of the work and to witness the evolution of the students in relation to their learning, their understanding of the subject, their difficulties. It is possible to correct or redirect students along the way to improve the process and the final product.

The objective of changing the course format was achieved in that the level of student engagement during the viewing sessions was very good (despite the relatively long sessions). Also noteworthy is the collaborative environment among the students, which encourages and supports each other.

A small downside to the old course format where students clearly gained in comfort and confidence in front of the class as they gave presentations, the video format - which allows shy students to “hide” behind the video - creates a certain distance.