Self-Learning Efficiency in College Virtual Course of Engineering Mathematics on YouTube

The author has provided more than 2100 engineering mathematics teaching materials on YouTube since 2014. The viewer information provided by YouTube revealed that (1) 59.16% of viewers were 18 to 24 years old while 23.18% were over 35 years old, (2) the gender ratio was 4:1 (male–female), (3) 9.19% of viewers subscribed to the educational channel, (4) 88.13% of viewers were from Taiwan and 1.97% from Hong Kong, and (5) the proportion of “External Sources” and “Playlist” was 26.91% and 25.30%, respectively. Such viewer demographics help adjust the principles of tutorial videos. For instance, nearly 60% of the viewers were college students, and their expectations aligned with the grading criteria set by instructors. The majority of college instructors arrange written examinations and present engineering mathematics content in a handwritten manner. Around 25% of the students had richer life experiences and no examination pressure. Therefore, proverbs or idioms related to life philosophy in videos better resonated with these viewers. Tutorial videos were created to assist self-learners in mastering engineering mathematics. The data over the past nine years on YouTube serve as a valuable reference in constructing instructional videos for engineering. This virtual tutorial experience provides a basis to adjust the direction of future tutorial video recordings.