A number of years ago, I came across a book that had a powerful influence on me, E-Learning and the Science of Instruction, by Clark and Mayer. I would recommend it to anyone who prepares teaching materials for display on a screen.

I learned that there is an entire science of how students learn best while watching a screen (“best” means most time-efficient, with long knowledge retention.) I’ve tried to apply this science to the materials I’ve prepared, and although I don’t have a randomized study to back me up, I believe that following these tested principals works the best.

1. Early on, you need to decide whether you are primarily teaching, or primarily entertaining.

You can try to do both, but it’s very difficult to do a good job, because:

• • The rules governing good entertainment and good education are different.
  • The structure of what you create is different.
  • The tools you use are different and frequently mutually exclusive.

2. We learn using two channels, audio and visual

We learn “best” when we use both channels at the same time, so long as:

• • The two channels are supportive of each other and not in conflict.
  • The channels are not identical (e.g., having the narrator read a sentence off the screen is not good for learning. The audience immediately switches off their learning mode and shifts into a fact-checker mode…did the narrator read the sentence accurately?

Avoid placing a single sentence on the screen, even if that’s all you’ve got to make your point. Much better is to break the sentence into three “bullets” or key words. Put the three key words on the screen and let the narrator say whatever he was planning on saying. In this way, the visual element (bullets) and audio element (narrator) are mutually supporting.

3. Less is Better than More

Generally, the fewer words you place on your screen the better. The less complicated you make an image the better. The important thing is to avoid cognitive overload. The less the brain has to process, the easier it is to learn.

4. Simple Drawings are Better than Complicated Drawings

The simple drawing of cardiac circulation led to better understanding of heart circulation than the more complicated, but anatomically more accurate version.

(Drawing from Butcher, K.R. Learning from text with diagrams: Promoting mental model development and inference generation. Journal of Educational Psychology, 98 , 182–197. 2006)

5. Have a Consistent Format

Each of your “slides” should have the same basic format. If you are showing a picture on the right of the slide, with the accompanying text bullets on the left, then you should always do it that way. If you are using a 24 point white Calibri san serif font, then you should always use that font in your presentation and not shift around. Shifting distracts from learning.

6. Minimalist Background

The background of your screen should be essentially invisible. In that way, your audience will focus instead on the bullets or images you place on the background. Any interesting background is bad for teaching (might be good for entertaining), because it draws the learners eyes away from your diagram toward the interesting flower, or the OR scene, or very faint picture of the medical school.

For these reasons, I often use a plain black background. That is the safest. But I acknowledge I’m trying to primarily teach, and entertainment is not the goal.

7. Use of Tables

Tables are usually bad, and sometimes very bad for on-screen education, particularly if they are complex. Students will naturally try to figure out the table and each entry’s relationship to the other entries. While they are busy trying to do this, they’re no longer listening to what you have to say. Tables should be used sparingly, if at all.

8. Use of Images

Your images should be carefully chosen to be good examples of whatever you are discussing. Your reader’s eyes are drawn immediately to the image, and if the image (pretty flower, French Impressionist painting, etc.) has nothing to do with lecture material, you will have interrupted the learning thought processes with no positive yield.

Often, a simple graphic is better than a photograph. Flowcharts (point A arrows to point b, which arrows to point c) can capture the essential elements of what you are trying to say, without becoming educationally distracting.

9. Motion is generally Bad

We’ve all seen PowerPoint lectures in which a bird flies in from the side and delivers the next slide. While this may briefly have some entertainment value, motion is almost always bad when you are trying to teach someone something. Motion immediately captures the viewers eyes, taking them away from whatever information was on the screen. Motion forces the brain to shift from learning to defense (is this motion a threat?). Motion is very disruptive to the learning process, and I recommend you never use it.

The exception to this rule is if motion is integral to the student’s understanding of the process. I produced my 5-Minute Vaginal Delivery, as an introduction for the students to understand, at least superficially, the mechanics of the delivery. For this purpose, I needed to show an actual delivery. Sequential still pictures won’t capture the reality.

10. Avatars are Good

An Avatar is a small helper person who pops up on the screen from time to time to offer words of encouragement, answer questions, and be generally supportive. These are also known as “on-screen coaches” or  “pedagogical agents”

Using Avatars is helpful to learning and retention. The physical appearance of the Avatar is unimportant…it can be an actual person, a paperclip, or a cartoon character. What is important is the voice must be a real human voice.

In my training videos, I frequently use my own image and voice as an Avatar. My image and voice are free, always available, have some connection to the educational process, and are reasonably believable. I don’t have the best speaking voice, but because I consistently use the same voice, I think people get used to it and they don’t notice I’m not a professional narrator.

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