Import PowerPoint

Moodle1.6

The goal of this feature is to capture text and and graphics from a series of MS PowerPoint presentation slides and insert them into the content area of a series of branch tables, as text and images. The title of the page come from the title of the PowerPoint slide. The descriptions on the branch page are blank, so the initial settings will follow the flow control parameter in lesson settings.

Simple text presentations with simple graphic images can be imported without much trouble. It will not import things like underlining but will import some of the simple bullets. At the moment this feature is best used by teachers who want to do an initial lesson outline in MS PowerPoint. Do not expect it to handle the rich outlining and graphics potentials of MS PowerPoint. See tips below.

Remember, a poorly designed course will not magically improve when placed in Moodle. And poorly designed PowerPoint will not improve when it is imported into a Lesson. In other words, a page with 20 bullets and text in a tiny font, might not work on a Lesson page for students or with the importPPT function.

The instructions

1. Create the Web Folder
   • Open the MS PowerPoint presentation
   • In "File" click on "Save as"
   • Change or note "Save In" setting
   • Set Save "file type" pulldown menu to "Web Page"
   • click on "Save"
2. Zip the folder
   • Find the folder you just created
   • Zip the folder with your favorite program
3. In Moodle, import the PowerPoint
   • Create the Lesson, set the settings, save settings
   • Select "Import PowerPoint"
   • Select "Continue"
   • Start editing the branch pages

Tips

1. Keep it simple, text only is best
   • No page numbers
   • No text boxes with graphic or filled backgrounds
   • Don't worry about your masterslide, none of its content will import
   • Watermarks and text over graphics is probably not a good idea
   • It will import some bullet formats but not all
2. Graphic images can be imported as a part of the presentation but
   • Graphic images will have to be moved in the Lesson page
   • More than one graphic image might not always import to a Lesson page
3. Check each page in student view
   • Make sure all your bullets are there
   • Double check your text when there is a lot on a page
   • Did it import the right number of graphic objects

Examples

1. Use PowerPoint as a story board with simple text content and include descriptions for the branch table button. Remember the first line of text in outline view, will be your Lesson page title. So you can also put in the jump for each description as text as a reminder where to set the jumps. After the import into a lesson, go into edit mode. In each page cut and paste the description text from content area to the description areas. Sorry, you can not cut & paste the jump text, so set the jumps and then delete the jump material in content.

1. Edit down a PowerPoint that was designed to run off a CD and import it as the basis of a lesson. Sometimes creating a new PowerPoint is easier than cleaning up an old one.

See also

• Using Moodle Import Powerpoint html to lesson forum discussion