The lectures are presented in PowerPoint. You may be wondering why I am using PowerPoint and not something like Panopto or VoiceThread. Below are a few reasons.

1. By presenting the lectures in PowerPoint, you do not have to download any type of software to open the lectures. Rather, you can download the PowerPoint slides and view them and/or save them to your computer.

2. If you want to, you can print out the slides (1 per page, 3 per page, 6 per page, etc) and take notes on them. Why take notes by hand? Mueller and Oppenheimer (2014) found that students who took longhand notes (notes by hand) performed better on conceptual questions than individuals who took notes using a laptop. Their findings have been replicated.

3. You can click through the PowerPoint slides and listen to the audio for each slide as many times as you would like. You can stop the audio to take notes and then continue to play the audio file. Please note, you must download the PowerPoint (PPT) slides to listen to the audio clips and/or read the transcripts.

4. If there is an audio clip, the note section (under each slide) of the PowerPoint slide contains the transcript of the audio clip(s).

5. You can also play the slides in the Slide Show mode (or in the Video Format). This option provides you with more of a video type feel. The auditory information will be provided as you click through the slides. To use the slide show mode, press F5 or click on the slide show icon located in the button located at the bottom of the PowerPoint slide. If you choose the Video Format option, the slides will play for you (you do not have to click through). Please note that these two options (slide show and video format) do not provide a transcript of the audio files.

Slide Show Icon.png

Please remember that while you are more than welcome to download the files for your use, they may not be shared with anyone outside of our class. Please see the Restrictions on Disclosure and Distribution section of the syllabus for additional information.

6. Like Word, PowerPoint has a free text-to-speech program called Speak. You can find more information about Speak here: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/use-the-speak-text-to-speech-feature-to-read-text-aloud-459e7704-a76d-4fe2-ab48-189d6b83333c.. Please note, if there is an audio clip,the note section (under each slide) of the PowerPoint slide contains the transcript of the audio clip(s).

I am hoping that being able to print out the slides, view the slides in two different ways (PPT format and Video format), access the audio transcripts, and play the audio clips as many times as you would like will be helpful for you as you learn new information. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns.