Dr van der Meer, who is associate dean, education, at the university College of Education, calls this video-clip approach "bite-size M-learning".
The clips, no longer than 15 minutes long, are designed to be used by students taking a large first year class, an introductory course in human development, at the college.
M-learning refers to accessing learning material through mobile devices, although the same material can also be accessed through desktop computers or laptops.
A former co-ordinator at the university's Student Learning Centre, Dr van der Meer is no newcomer to finding new ways to engage first-year students.
His earlier doctoral research at Otago focused on the academic challenges of first-year students in their first semester at university. The research showed a need to communicate academic expectations to students more clearly.
Some students indicated they were being expected to be "mind readers" and were unclear exactly what was required, the study showed.
After nearly six years at the university learning centre, Dr van der Meer transferred last year to the College of Education, taking up the newly created position of associate dean, academic. Apart from his associate dean roles, he also co-ordinates the large first year class in human development, enabling him to put into practice what he had "preached" in his research.
The course had been running very successfully for many years but, until last year, had been offered in the second semester. It will now be the first main education paper for first-year students, which meant students needed to be introduced to "a range of academic skills that were new to them".
"And we need to make sure we engage them and not lose them."
The concept of M-learning was not new but "the rapid growth of wireless access and devices such as smartphones and iPads have made M-learning a hot topic again".
The learning material Dr van der Meer is creating with his teaching team -"a fantastic bunch of colleagues"- involves video clips, with the "talking heads" of lecturers and power point slides.
What he had added to M-learning was the idea of "bite-size learning".
"The lecturers engage the student by asking them questions, getting them to stop the video every now and then, and encouraging them to think about particular problems and/or discussing these with other students."
The short duration of the video clips enabled them to be fitted into students' often busy schedules.
Importantly, this approach also had a greater chance of engaging with "the YouTube generation - a new generation of students more used to technology-enhanced learning approaches and who seem to respond well to visual stimulation".
Some of the video clips have learning content directly related to human development, but some others focus on key academic skills such as essay writing.
M-Learning
• Growth in mobile learning.- Bite-size M-learning, being developed at University of Otago, involves creating educational video clips, no longer than 15 minutes, to be played by students on smartphones and other computers.
• More than 98% of University of Otago students have portable laptop computers, and more than half also have another internet-linked portable device, such as a smartphone, up from 17% in 2008.
• Podcasts of some University of Otago lectures, which students can play on laptops, MP3 players and other devices, began in 2008.
• Downloads have greatly increased, from over 330,000 in 2009 to over 800,000 last year, and are expected to reach a million this year.