Some
lecturers here at the UWI Mona Campus post their slides before class because
they believe that this will advance learning. Others feel that if students
receive PowerPoint slides before the class, then they will not attend or they
might come to class and be disengaged, surfing the net and having a good time
otherwise. But is there a possibility
that having the slides before class might free students to concentrate on what
is happening in class and think in multiple ways about the content that is
being taught?
There
is some evidence that suggests that students do better when they have the
PowerPoint slides and take additional notes during the class time. Marsh and
Sink (2010) did a small study on students who had received advanced copies of
the presentation for their class before actually attending. They examined the
quality of the notes that they took during the class. They also looked at the
quality of the notes that students who did not receive an advanced copy of the
slides took. Further, the students’ performances on course tests were also
investigated.
They
found that students without the slides took more notes but they were basically
verbatim copies of the content of the slides presented during class. Both groups recorded additional information
from lecture and class discussion in equal amounts. Overall, they noticed that the students who
received a copy of the slides as handouts before class performed better than
students who took notes and received the slides after the class.
What do
you think? Make your own case for giving
he slides before or after the class/lecture.
