Instructors have a few different ways to embed videos into their eClass course for students to watch. Please review our lecture recording overview for information on how to record videos. 

Please note: sharing via URL linking or via embedding externally-hosted video from the three tools described below are the recommended processes for putting videos in eClass as opposed to uploading video files directly. Uploading videos directly into your course may result in longer load times and performance issues. 

Embedding videos using the editor

You can embed media anywhere in your eClass course as long as it has an HTML editing area (i.e. section headings, forum posts, online assignment submissions, essay questions, page resources, etc.)

The following example will demonstrate how to embed video from a University of Alberta google drive account. Generally, users will need to obtain an embed code for a video they want to be shown in their course.

A. Obtain embed code from video:

1. In the University Google Drive, open the context menu for the video you want, and click Share.

2. Here, you can choose to add users or groups to whom you want the video Shared. You may also adjust the scope of access, e.g., to all of the University, to anyone, or to restricted to those listed.

Note: You can also limit the ability for users to download a video in the google drive settings as well. You can do this through the advanced settings under the gear icon at the top right and unchecking 'Viewers and commenters can see the option to download, print, and copy', so that users cannot directly download the video in the Google Drive interface:

 3. To obtain the embed code, open the video preview (double-click, or right-click preview) and click on the 3-dots to open the menu. Open in new window.

4. In the new window opened, click on the 3-dots and click Embed item...

5. Embed item settings will display an embed code for you to use.

B. Embed the video: 

For this example, we will embed the video into a Text and Media area resource.

1. With Edit mode on, click Add an activity or resource and choose Text and media area.

4. In the controls, dropdown the list of tools by click on the button, then click on the Edit HTML code button 

5. Here, you will paste your embed code into the box. Note: There may be existing or extraneous HTML code that you can delete before pasting.

6. Click Save and return to course.

7. The Text and Media area resource should display: 

This article will explain how to add simple web links into any editable content area where the HTML editor is available. For instructors the main places would be: the content section headers of their course home page, as content within page resources, in descriptions of activities or resources, and in forum posts. For students, the main places for this would be in the content of online text assignment submissions and in forum posts.

For instructors, common spots for adding media would include the content sections of pages, quizzes, assignments, and discussions.

For students, media would most commonly be added to Discussion posts or in assignments requiring online entry submissions. This article will show the process from a student's point of view when adding a video to a Discussion post, but the process is common to all content entry locations.

Adding a video to a content area (example)

To add YuJa videos in a discussion post, for example, click the +Add Discussion button, add a topic, open the content editor, then select the YuJa button:

Note: If the YuJa button is hidden, you can find it under the plug-in button marked above.

YuJa videos can also be added to any content editor in quizzes, assignments and pages.

Uploading media

The first time a student accesses YuJa, no media will be available to select, so they should select Upload media or Record content:

When uploading, it is possible to drag and drop or browse to upload existing video files. Once selected, these will appear in a progress bar below the uploader while they are in progress:

Recording media

If students do not have their own media content to add, they can record content.

To record, students will first need to download the YuJa desktop capture application and should select the desktop recording option (browser recording is recommended only if a user is working on a machine that does not have the desktop capture application installed):

Once launched, the capture application allows users to select the video, audio, and screen feeds:

More information on recording videos in YuJa can be found in Recording Videos Using YuJa and on the YuJa support portal.

Adding media to a course

Once they have uploaded or recorded a video, students will need to re-launch the Yuja Media Chooser from the Discussion editor. They should now see the media they have added, which can then be selected and inserted:

Once the YuJa video title appears in the discussion topic content area, it can be posted into the forum or assignment by clicking Insert Content.

The resulting Discussion post will display the video in the message frame. Since it is hyperlinked from YuJa, it does not increase the file storage in the course.

Sometimes multiple choice quiz questions will be displayed in different colours or may have additional line spacing added.

Distracting formatting is commonly caused by pasting content from coded text such as Microsoft Word or web pages which copy unwanted format codes.

This article outlines how to repair the formatting easily and prevent student distractions during exams.

To fix formatting errors in quiz questions:

• Click to turn on Edit mode in the top right corner of your course page;
• Click on the quiz
• Click to open a Preview;
• Navigate through the questions until you find a misformatted question;
• Click on 'Edit question' on the left side:

• On the question editing screen, locate the misformatted text in the ‘Question text’ field or in any of the specific answer choices;
• Click on the down-pointing arrow button to expand the toolbar options and look for the HTML button: 

• Each answer should have no other coding at the beginning and end of the answer choice except as shown in this example:

• Preserve coding for individual symbols, words, or phrases that indicate formats such as italics, superscripts, or subscripts
• Clicking “Save changes” will return you to the quiz or exam
• You may have to start a new Preview to see the change to your question

Your formatting issue should be resolved:

Note: The tag "<p>” is a paragraph marker that draws its style from a hidden style sheet which sets the paragraph colour and spacing. Some other coding overwrites that style with extra line spaces or different colours.

Note: Alternatively, deleting all HTML coding at the beginning and end of an answer choice will remove all colours and leave behind no line space issues.

As a preventative measure, users are encouraged to Paste and Match Style (paste without formatting, paste as plain text, etc) so that all previous formatting and styles are ignored when pasted. If you are pasting from a formatting-heavy source, doing so will cause you to lose things like bolded headers, highlights, bullet points, etc. so you would have to reformat them after pasting content into eClass.

However, if it is after the fact, and you have noticed inconsistencies with formatting in your course content, you can try these steps to remove unwanted formatting (inconsistent colours, extra spaces, etc) from your content.

The following video shows a simple example of how to quickly clear formatting from content. 

For how to remove formatting from multiple choice question responses, please click here.

Note: Depending on the amount of effort required to make changes, it may be easier to correct one-offs. In the workflow described above, removing all tags typically display a default system Black font colour. However, if you wished to instead make them blue (matching the style colour), you would have to add opening and closing P tags. e.g. <p> </p> The link above will illustrate this.