How to make a quiz video for your class
Show one question with its answer choices, give students time to think, then reveal the answer and say why. What the research says, and how to make one fast.
By the Chasca team 5 min read
To make a quiz video, show one question with three or four answer choices on screen while it is read out, give students a pause to think, then reveal the right answer and explain why it is right. Keep each quiz video to one question or a short set of them, use wrong answers that come from real mistakes, and always explain the answer, because a multiple-choice question without feedback can teach the wrong one. In Chasca, you paste the question and its choices, say which answer is right and how to mark it, and get a narrated video that keeps every choice on the board and circles the right answer.
Why put a quiz in a video?
Because answering a question from memory is one of the most reliable ways to learn, and a video on its own doesn’t ask for it.
- Testing beats restudying. Henry Roediger and Jeffrey Karpicke had students either reread a passage or recall it. Rereading won on a test five minutes later, but recalling won on tests two days and a week later.
- The effect holds up. A 2017 meta-analysis by Olusola Adesope and colleagues pooled 272 effect sizes from 118 articles and found practice tests beat restudying and every other comparison, with an overall effect size of g = 0.61.
- Quizzes keep viewers with you. In a study by Karl Szpunar and colleagues at Harvard, students watched a recorded lecture in four parts. Those quizzed after each part mind-wandered about half as often, took more notes and scored 90% on the final test, against 68% for students who were not quizzed.
A quiz video turns watching into answering.
What makes a good quiz question?
A good question tests one idea, and its wrong answers tell you something when students pick them.
- One idea per question. If a student gets it wrong, you should know what they misunderstood.
- A clear question. Students should know what is being asked before they read the choices.
- Three or four choices. Michael Rodriguez’s review of 80 years of research found three options work as well as four or five, so you can write fewer, better ones.
- Wrong answers from real mistakes. The best distractors are the answers students actually give: the sign error, the unit mix-up, the common misconception.
- No “all of the above”. It rewards test-taking tricks rather than knowledge.
How should a quiz video be structured?
| Part | What happens | Rough length |
|---|---|---|
| Question | The question and every choice appear on screen and are read out | 10 to 20 seconds |
| Pause | Quiet, and an invitation to pause the video | A few seconds, more for a calculation |
| Reveal | The right answer is marked, for example circled | A moment |
| Why | Why it is right, and why the most tempting wrong answer is wrong | 20 to 40 seconds |
| Recap | The idea in one sentence | 5 seconds |
A single question fits in about a minute, which makes it easy to slot into a lesson, a revision playlist or a homework task.
How long should you pause before the answer?
Longer than feels comfortable. In Mary Budd Rowe’s research on classroom questioning, teachers typically waited about a second for an answer, and when they learned to wait three seconds or more, students gave longer, more thoughtful answers and more of them answered.
A video can’t see whether students are ready, so give them control: say “pause the video and work it out”, leave a few seconds of quiet before the reveal, and leave more for multi-step problems.
Why explain the answer?
Because multiple choice can also teach the wrong answer. Andrew Butler and Henry Roediger found that a multiple-choice test boosted later recall, but students sometimes learned the wrong answers they had picked. Feedback fixed that: with it, more answers were right later and fewer wrong choices stuck.
So never just mark the answer and move on. Say why it is right, and name the mistake behind the most tempting wrong answer.
Can you make a quiz video in Arabic?
Yes, and the details matter. In Arabic math, equations written in Arabic-Indic digits are usually written right to left, as they are taught across the Gulf, the Levant and Egypt: the first term on the right and the result on the left. The board should lay out from the right too, with the question and the choices in their full Arabic text.
Chasca follows the digits you write: Arabic-Indic digits are written right to left, and Western digits stay left to right. The Arabic math page shows how a quiz scene is laid out.
How do you make a quiz video with Chasca?
- Paste the question with its answer choices, in any language. One question per video works best.
- Say which answer is right and how to mark it, for example: “circle the right answer in green”.
- Pick a length, a voice and a drawing style, or leave every setting on Auto. Chalkboard and Crayon suit classrooms.
- Watch it draw. The video keeps the question and every choice on the board, reads them out, and circles the right answer in the color you asked for when the narrator reaches it. Like every Chasca lesson, it ends with a question to answer from memory and a short recap.
- Check every answer. If a number is off, fix it in the question and make the video again; it takes about a minute.
Your first 2 videos are free, up to a minute each. The education page has more ideas for lessons.
A checklist for every quiz video
- One idea per question.
- Three or four choices, with wrong answers from real mistakes.
- Every choice on screen while it is read out.
- A pause, and an invitation to pause the video.
- The answer marked, then explained.
- A one-sentence recap.
Sources
- Roediger, H. L., & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249–255.
- Adesope, O. O., Trevisan, D. A., & Sundararajan, N. (2017). Rethinking the use of tests: A meta-analysis of practice testing. Review of Educational Research, 87(3), 659–701.
- Szpunar, K. K., Khan, N. Y., & Schacter, D. L. (2013). Interpolated memory tests reduce mind wandering and improve learning of online lectures. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 110(16), 6313–6317.
- Rodriguez, M. C. (2005). Three options are optimal for multiple-choice items: A meta-analysis of 80 years of research. Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice, 24(2), 3–13.
- Rowe, M. B. (1986). Wait time: Slowing down may be a way of speeding up! Journal of Teacher Education, 37(1), 43–50.
- Butler, A. C., & Roediger, H. L. (2008). Feedback enhances the positive effects and reduces the negative effects of multiple-choice testing. Memory & Cognition, 36(3), 604–616.
Video transcript What the narrator says in the 1:00 explainer above.
Picture a teacher asking one question at the board. How do you turn that into a quiz video students learn from? Show the question and three or four choices, read every choice aloud, give students time to think, then mark the right answer and explain why.
Answering from memory matters. Henry Roediger and Jeffrey Karpicke found rereading won on a test five minutes later, but recalling won on tests two days and a week later. Keep each question to one idea, with wrong answers drawn from real mistakes, so a choice shows what students misunderstood.
Before revealing the answer, invite students to pause the video and work it out. Leave a few seconds of quiet, more for a calculation. Then explain why the answer is right and the tempting wrong answer is wrong. What turns watching into learning? Answering from memory, then getting feedback.
Questions people ask
Write one question with three or four answer choices, show the question and every choice on screen while it is read out, pause long enough for students to think, then reveal the right answer and explain why it is right and why the most tempting wrong answer is wrong. In Chasca, you paste the question with its choices, say which answer is right and how to mark it, and the video keeps every choice on the board and circles the right one.
Yes. A meta-analysis of 118 articles found that practice tests beat restudying and other ways of learning, with an overall effect size of g = 0.61. In a Harvard study of a recorded lecture split into four parts, students quizzed after each part mind-wandered about half as often and scored 90% on the final test, against 68% for students who were not quizzed.
Long enough to think, which is longer than it feels. In classroom research on wait time, teachers who waited three seconds or more after a question got longer, more thoughtful answers. In a video, tell students to pause it, and leave a few seconds of quiet before the reveal; leave more for a calculation.
Yes. In Chasca, write the question and its choices in Arabic. Equations in Arabic-Indic digits are written right to left, as they are taught, the board lays out from the right, and the right answer is circled in the color you ask for.
