YouTube Stories: How Aussies are learning through video
Returning to the simpler things in life, Aussies are picking up spades and spatulas.
For 15 years, people have been doing things alone, together, on YouTube. It's so common that it has its own hashtag, #WithMe. Our creators and community have used video to help people learn, connect, entertain and thrive. And this has never been more evident than over the last few months.
As Australians (and the world) isolate ourselves and stay home, we’ve been picking up hobbies and learning new skills to occupy our time and feel productive -- and two trends we’ve seen grow are Plant With Me and Cook With Me.
The average daily views of ‘gardening’ videos by Aussies has increased over 120 percent since 15 March 2020, when compared to the average daily views for the rest of the year.
We’re looking for hacks from how to maintain our gardens to stem-cutting methods to regrow plants, for advice on fast growing vegetables and herbs we can plant at home (basil, garlic, onion and coriander being amongst the most common), as well as what set-ups are best for where we live.
One Aussie channel that’s guiding us is Self Sufficient Me (788K subscriber), whose video on 8 Fast Growing Vegetables You Can Grow at Home in a Hurry was one of the most viewed locally between 15 March and 21 April 2020.
Moving from the garden to the kitchen and we have seen the average global daily views of videos with ‘cook with me’ in the title increase by over 100 percent since 15 March 2020, compared to their average views for the rest of the year. Between 15 March-10 April, views of bread baking videos also peaked in Australia for 2020, increasing by more than 260 percent, compared to the prior daily average for the year.
YouTube enables anyone, anywhere, at any time to access information. And with over 500 hours of video uploaded every minute, there are constantly new learning opportunities at people’s fingertips -- and we’re devouring them, with hundreds of millions of views of educational content on YouTube every single day globally.
Cree Monaghan and Tim Hall are locals who used YouTube to learn and follow their passions…
From little things, big things grow
“If you haven’t grown up on a farm, it’s really hard without a resource like YouTube.”
Cree Monaghan and Tim Hall made the green change in 2014, moving from the city to a ‘blank canvas’, 100 acre property in Margaret River, Western Australia. Their goal -- to try to improve the health of the land, their family, and ultimately, the planet.
The couple, understandably, was daunted when they bought the property as they were starting from scratch with nothing on the parcel of land and knowing very little about farming. Both Cree and Tim recall that every single thing required having to learn something new and that they had absolutely no idea how much work goes into growing food.
“We had input from other people, but our farmer friends are not always alongside us every time something goes wrong. And that’s when we turn to YouTube. How to build a chicken coop, how we increase the fertility of the soil, pruning the orchard, how to set up electric fencing, how to move pigs around.”
But creating their farm wasn’t enough. Inspiring and educating others was critical, so the next step was One Table Farm -- a cooking school to teach people about regenerative farming, whether that be starting to make their own bread, composting differently or knowing how to grow a tomato.
“If we run this farm in isolation and don’t share it with anybody, then it doesn’t reach its full potential.”
Soon, the journey will come full circle with Cree and Tim starting their own YouTube channel to share what they have learned with the world.
This is just one example of the many learning stories on YouTube where we can see the ripple effects of online connections make their way into the real world. Watch more of our YouTube Learning Stories, or start your own learning journey now with YouTube Learning.
