Talking Tutorials
New software lets educators create online tutorials that move, talk, and quiz students
By Walter Minkel -- School Library Journal, 5/1/2004
A new generation of software programs has transformed stodgy tutorials into moving, talking online sensations. These new programs, such as Macromedia's RoboDemo 5 (www.macromedia.com), TechSmith's Camtasia (www.techsmith.com), and Qarbon's Viewlet Builder (www.qarbon.com), let students and educators learn independently by watching, listening, and then doing. The latest generation of products even quizzes users on what they've learned.
Sabrina Sterling, a technology teacher at the Mamie Lou Gross Elementary School in Woodbine, GA, has often noticed that students in grades 3–5 learn best when instructional software programs include a mascot. So when she created an online tutorial to teach kids WordPad, a simple word-processing program, she included a mouse mascot named Mega Byte, which she adapted from some Microsoft clip art. Sterling recruited her 10th-grade daughter, Anja, to record a voice for the character. Every time kids are introduced to a new tutorial skill—for example, learning how to add images to a WordPad document—the friendly talking mouse is there to guide them. Sterling also created 12 video lessons—really Flash animations—along with a pretest and a posttest, allowing students to assess how much they've learned, and a couple of games to help kids master word-processing vocabulary. (To see the Mrs. Sterling's Word Pad tutorial site, visit www.sabrinasterling.com.)
Sterling says that the online tutorial has been extremely successful. She keeps track of the number of hits her Web site receives, and has noticed a spike on days when she presents lessons in the computer lab. Many children log in after class to practice what they've learned, she explains. Sterling and the school's media specialist, Kimberly Picou, plan to produce tutorials on library skills, such as searching the online catalog or using periodical databases. As for Sterling's daughter, she's become a mini-celebrity, after students recognized her as the voice of Mega Byte.
Online tutorials give kids an opportunity to use software programs over and over, until they've mastered the essential skills. And since many students have access to the Internet at home, they can practice using the programs even when they aren't in school. And that's exactly what Sterling had in mind: "I wanted to keep teaching them when I wasn't there," she says.
Frank Bridge, a technology manager for the Chesterfield County (VA) Public Library, used Camtasia—a software program that records, edits, and plays back simple computer functions, such as pulling down a menu—to create a tutorial on Microsoft Outlook. He saved the lessons on CDs and sent them to staff members who needed training on using the popular e-mail program.
Bridge says that many adults—just like many young students—are visual learners, and an interactive online tutorial is a much better way to familiarize them with complex software than simply lecturing them. His animated Outlook tutorials have drawn compliments from staff members, and he plans to create tutorials on using more of Microsoft Office's software, and on how to search the library's online databases.
Bridge says, however, that producing animated software tutorials is a time-consuming job. Even with years of experience in creating tutorials, "it still took me eight hours of study to produce about one hour of video," he says. But Bridge remains a big fan of the new programs: they're a great way to train students, faculty, and staff members who use software and online library resources when a librarian isn't there to help them.
