Unit of Instruction

Slide Tune-Up for Improved Learning

Jeff Toorongian-EDTECH506-Spring 2011

Unit Goals
This unit of instruction includes five lessons (four lessons developed for this project) covering key techniques to improve presentation slide design. It begins with an introductory lesson, followed by lessons on signaling, weeding, chunking, and multimedia design techniques. The unit is designed for online asynchronous delivery to university instructors of all ranks through the Blackboard learning management system. The lessons are designed as short technique primers for busy instructors. Each lesson is estimated to require no more than thirty minutes to complete and learners can progress through the unit at their own pace. Participants will have advanced educational levels ranging from graduate students, post-docs, and various professorial ranks. All participants will possess at least basic computer skills and in many cases will have intermediate or advanced skills with specific software including PowerPoint, Keynote, or similar. Goals for the instructional unit include: - Establish the importance of well-designed presentation slides to support learning. - Review of common design flaws including: extraneous information poor font choices poor use of white space (overcrowding) inconsistent design and layout (use of templates) poor use of visuals/clip art - Introduce design techniques to improve readability and reduce information overload. - Provide examples of improved presentation slide designs. - Guide participants in the redesign of an existing presentation slide.

Goals/Curriculum Relationship
Goals in this instructional unit reflect department goals in support of university teaching and learning efforts. The workshop adheres to goal 1.1 of the university's strategic plan, which calls for support of professional development and collaborative opportunities. The workshop also provides opportunities for lifelong learning and continuous improvement for all members of the university community.

Learner Characteristics
This instructional unit is intended primarily for university instructors who use presentation slides (PowerPoint, Keynote, etc.) as a primary component of their teaching materials. Faculty are busy people, so this instruction is not intended as a comprehensive unit on all the intricacies of effective presentation slide design. Instead, it is offered as a primer of common design problems and proven techniques that can help them improve their existing presentations quickly, and create new content using these design principles. Intended as a university-wide resource, participants from all academic departments will be invited to participate in the training. This campus-wide participant community will feature a demographic mix of age, gender, and ethnicity. The audience will reflect the needs typical of a well-educated adult learner population.

Learners Present Level of Performance and Knowledge

It is expected that participants in the unit lessons will have basic computing skills including a basic knowledge of the slide presentation software they use to produce their teaching materials. Basic competence with mouse/keyboard manipulation, and file management skills associated with their specific operating system are required. Additionally, participants will be required to have a familiarity with web browsing to access the training materials and any online resources that are included. Web browsing skills may also be necessary for cloud-based presentation production tools.

Classroom Layout and Participant Group

This training unit is designed for online delivery. Participants will be required to access all content through a Blackboard-enabled web course. Participants will be required to have a valid university password to access the course. Although the unit is intended as an independent study activity, discussion forums will be provided to post comments and ask questions of the workshop moderator.

Introductory Procedures
To prime participants, an introductory lesson will provide background information on human information processing theory. The concept of cognitive load will be introduced and its importance will be established in relation to effective presentation slides and improved student learning. The four design techniques in the unit will be introduced and additional information of cognitive load will be offered through YouTube video presentations.

Media and Materials

Workshop materials in this online instructional unit will be delivered through Blackboard, the university learning management system. Lesson content will be delivered in standard html web page format. External links for additional resources will be provided for optional additional information. Demonstration slide content, and before/after comparison slides will be embedded in the lesson pages and also available as native resolution links to allow for a more detailed study of the design techniques. Participants will have random access to the instructional content. The following resources are required for full participation in this instructional unit: A computer with broadband Internet connectivity is required to access all instructional content. Flash and Silverlight browser plug-ins will be required for full functionally with the resource materials. Blackboard- the university learning management system. All content for this instructional unit will be delivered from the Blackboard course, including instructional media presentations, links to examples and external resource sites. Presentation slide creation software: Microsoft PowerPoint, Apple Keynote, OpenOffice. Cloud-based options include Prezi, and Google Docs, among others. Image editing software to create and modify visuals for the presentation slides. Adobe CS4 or CS5 software tools are recommended but other bitmap and vector-based editing tools will also work.

Visuals
Visual 4 Design Techniques to Help Improve Learning Typography examples Facts of Tooth Structure-demonstration slide on four design techniques Purpose Summary table introducing the for design techniques in the unit of instruction. Typographic designs that demonstrate: cognitive overload, signaling, and chunking. Integration slide design featuring examples of signaling, weeding, chunking, and multimedia. Used as a conclusion slide to the introductory lesson. Organizational design intended to help learner coordinate signaling design procedure. Interactive demonstration slide providing signaling techniques and descriptions in a javascript roll-over web graphic.

Three Steps to Signaling Molecules: The Key Ideas

Signaling-Directs Learner Attention summary slide

Summary slide for signaling lesson. Provides a detailed before/after comparison of signaling techniques applied to an example slide layout. Organizational design intended to help learner coordinate weeding design procedure. Summary slide for weeding lesson. Provides a detailed before/after comparison of weeding techniques applied to an example slide layout. Organizational design intended to help learner coordinate three types of chunking design. Example slide design highlighting procedural chunking technique. Summary slide for chunking lesson. Provides a detailed before/after comparison of chunking techniques applied to an example slide layout.

Three Steps to Weeding Weeding-Removes Extraneous Information summary slide Three Steps to Chunking Acid-Base Titration Chunking-Groups Related Material Spatially summary slide

Assessment and Evaluation of Learner

The concluding before/after slide designs are intended as lesson self-assessment tools for participants. Because this workshop is intended as a continuous improvement exercise and not a formal course, no traditional assessment will be administered to participants. Participants will be encouraged to submit before and after samples of their coursework presentation slides highlighting the improvements made through information presented in the training. These submissions will become part of the gallery archive for the Blackboard course and will be available for review by all current and future participants. Additionally, learners will be given an opportunity to post comments and suggestions in a gallery archive forum.

Assessment and Goals

Upon completion of each lesson, participants will have been introduced to key design concepts, provided visual examples of the techniques, and have been provided summary before/after slides to further establish the design concepts covered. Participants who put their new skills to work will have visual confirmation of their improvement. Learners who choose to post sample slides representing their improvements will also be aiding the efforts of future participants who will gain knowledge from the gallery archive of previous workshop participants.