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Curriculum

Module guide for the captioning course

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Six modules cover the full path from raw recording to finished caption file. Each one lists what you practise, so you can see how the course fits your needs.

Six modules

What each module teaches and what you practise

The modules follow the order of a caption job. You can read them in sequence or return to the one you need. Each has a practical activity on sample recordings and ends with work you can review against the checklist.

  1. 01

    Transcription Foundations

    You turn spoken interviews and talks into clean, accurate text. Practice covers handling terminology, names and unclear audio, deciding when to mark a passage as uncertain, and tidying false starts without changing meaning. Marcus reviews your transcripts and shows where a second listen would have caught an error.

  2. 02

    Timing and Subtitle Sync

    You learn to break text into readable caption lines and to set start and end times that match the speech. Practice uses a short talk on a timeline: you adjust line length, reading speed and gaps between captions until the text stays on screen long enough to read. Priya guides the timing exercises.

  3. 03

    Speaker Identification

    You practise labelling speakers and handling overlapping voices in panel discussions and event recordings. Exercises ask you to decide when a label is needed, how to show a change of speaker, and how to treat crosstalk without losing the point being made. Elena leads this module.

  4. 04

    Sound Descriptions

    You decide which non-speech sounds matter and write short, useful descriptions for viewers who cannot hear them. Practice uses event clips with music, applause and background noise. You learn to leave out sounds that add nothing and to word the rest plainly, with guidance from Elena.

  5. 05

    Quality Review

    You check captions for errors, reading speed and consistency using a simple review checklist on sample videos. The exercise is to review captions written by someone else, note each problem, and explain the fix. You then apply the same checklist to your own earlier work with Marcus.

  6. 06

    File Formats and Delivery

    You export captions as SRT and VTT files or embed them in the video, and learn when each option fits. Practice has you export the same captions in each format, open the files, and check them in a player. Priya explains how to choose between separate files and embedded captions.

Before you begin

What to bring and what you need first

We teach captioning as careful listening followed by careful reading: get the words right first, then make them easy for a viewer to follow.

The course assumes no earlier captioning experience. It suits beginners as well as video or events staff who already handle recordings and want to prepare captions themselves. You should be comfortable typing, using a computer and playing video files.

  • Clarity
  • Accuracy
  • Access
Teaching Approach
Study questions

Practical questions about preparing to study

Most questions we hear come from people who are unsure whether their current skills and equipment are enough. The short answer is that the course is built for beginners, so you do not need to have captioned anything before. What helps is patience with detail, since much of the work is listening to the same few seconds more than once.

You will need a computer that plays video smoothly, a pair of headphones and a quiet place to work. Headphones matter more than people expect, because small sounds and soft speech are easy to miss through laptop speakers. A basic text editor or the tools introduced in the timing module are enough to start.

Typing speed is not a barrier, but steady typing helps. Many learners find their speed improves simply through the transcription practice. If you already work with video or events, bring examples of the recordings you handle, since they show which modules matter most to you.

Study at a pace that suits your week. The modules are short enough to work through in focused sessions, and each ends with a task you can finish and review. If a module feels hard, repeat the practice recording before moving on rather than skipping ahead.

We do not promise a particular result or job outcome. What you can realistically expect is the ability to take a recording, produce readable captions with correct timing and speaker labels, check them against a checklist and deliver them in a suitable file format.

Have ready before the first module

  • A computer that plays video and audio smoothly
  • Headphones for close listening
  • A quiet place to work in focused sessions
  • A word processor or text editor
  • Example recordings you work with, if you have any
  • Willingness to listen to short passages several times