Using PowerPoints to assess students’ learning from multiple resources

Abstract

PowerPoints are among the most commonly used, yet infrequently investigated, classroom assignments. This study examines the features of PowerPoints that students produce based on multiple resources and associates these features with the quality of students’ oral presentations and information use behaviors during PowerPoint production. The MD-TRACE Model (Rouet & Britt, 2011) and Mayer’s SOI framework (1996) were used as guiding frameworks in this study. Confirming results from prior work, students were found to most frequently select resources based on their non-epistemic source features (e.g., length, information readability). Additionally, students were found to include a variety of organizational features (e.g., descriptive titles, topographical indicators, like bullets) on their slides. However, students’ inclusion of such organizational features negatively predicted the number of elaborated, added, and audience-directed idea units included in their oral presentations. Conversely, students’ purposeful exclusion of resources from their PowerPoints positively predicted elaborations during oral presentation delivery, suggesting complex patterns in the relation between multiple resource use and the quality of students’ PowerPoint presentations. Qualitative analysis of extreme cases was used to further explore patterns in students’ PowerPoint production.