Sharing Practice – PowerPoint narration for reflection, content creation and assessment
This academic year the audio narration feature in PowerPoint has been used by a number of staff and programme teams for a variety of tasks. Indeed, I have been genuinely surprised at how simple, efficient and effective the tool has been.
In both the TEL shared practice sessions, during inspiring teaching week, Di Lloyd shared her current practice of recording her lectures via this tool. In both sessions, all in attendance seemed impressed with the ease with which PowerPoint captured her voice and linked it to the slides. Colleagues also noted how helpful it would be as an aide-mémoir for sessions delivered once a year and for personal reflection.
To use narration Diane simply borrows a wireless mic from the AVIT team and then hits the narration button at the beginning of her sessions to record her voice over the slides. Diane states that:
“this is very simple to do and when you save it, it can be compressed and takes less space on blackboard. It is of benefit to students to listen to a voiceover as so much of PowerPoint is in reality just a prompt to a discussion rather than an end in itself. I also realised that the next time I did the lecture I could return and listen to my own explanations and examples and re-use or add additional information to enhance the session.”
Track and the Spodev team also employed PowerPoint narration earlier this year, but in their case they asked students to create them for an assessment. They found, amongst other benefits, that it saved them time, by freeing staff from ‘fixed presentation blocks’ and by allowing them to jump to key points of a presentation. It also, due to its re-watchable nature, helped with marking and moderation. Tips for staff interested in this approach include- showing students some examples early on and include at least one formative feedback opportunity as it will be something new for most students.
If you are interested in PPT narration or would like to know more about similar tools that are available on the web or on Blackboard, contact the TEL team or speak to any of the staff mentioned above. Di has kindly shared an extract from her sessions which is attached to this email, a critical summary of this feature is also offered by Jim Turner here and I have created a guide on how to record your own narration here.