YouTube's Social Media Analytics as an Evaluation of Educational Teaching Videos

During the COVID-19 lockdowns in South Africa undergraduate laboratory sessions were forbidden, in turn, video-based tutorials were proposed as a tentative solution to address the lack of in-person practical demonstration sessions. Five videos were filmed on electrical engineering topics, uploaded, and then publicly shared on YouTube. An investigation was then conducted as to whether videos may be useful for the teaching of practical engineering content in the university context. This article is a report back on the findings of using YouTube as a platform for sharing and evaluating engineering educational practical tutorial videos. The gaol of this article is to introduce YouTube's social media analytics as a tool for educators to evaluate their educational videos. The findings suggest that educators may consider evaluating their videos using social media analytics, but these analytics should be reviewed critically and should comprise of several metrics measured temporally. Understanding YouTube's recommender system and its influence on the platform is also an important factor in evaluating one's video content.