Comments on: Should You Add Background Audio to Your E-Learning Courses?

By: Viral Notebook | Michael M. Grant, Ph.D.

Viral Notebook | Michael M. Grant, Ph.D. — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 17:31:48 +0000

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By: JustinLink

JustinLink — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 21:18:12 +0000

Good post. This was very helpful and informative. I am an Instructional Technology graduate student at Bloomsburg University. Currently I am in the process of creating a learning program for radiology students on the anatomy of the shoulder. This article gives me some insight on the pros and cons of audio used in e-learning courses. As of right now, we are leaning on not using background music. Our lesson will be identification of the shoulder using images and x-rays. In this circumstance, I believe it will distract the learner. If any music would be used in a circumstance like ours, only use it in the intro and possibly at the end. This way it won’t distract the learner during the main part of the course.

I have participated in some e-learning courses in the past that had background music. In some instances, I found it to be distracting, rather than adding benefit. Like you said, sometimes the creator adds music in hopes of jazzing up the course. If music is inserted just for the sake of just adding music without a direct correlation to the content, it’s doing more harm than good. If background music is inserted into the course, I would prefer having the ability to turn it off. I know I could just turn the volume down, but sometimes there is narration along with the content.

Background music does work well with interactive courses. Like you said, background audio can create an immersive experience. In these instances, background music gets me more in the “zone” when I am in an interactive course, especially if the music changes when you click on a certain object or get to a certain point.

By: Sprecher Agentur

Sprecher Agentur — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 18:52:31 +0000

We do a lot of audio fpr elearning. Sometimes it is better just to have a plain voice, it depends on the product and viewer. But Wsound” it is one of the mostly underestimated things in elearning…

By: Chris @ eQuixotic

Chris @ eQuixotic — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 19:38:16 +0000

Regarding royalty-free clips, you can find a lot of great stuff included with recorders/editors such as Apple’s GarageBand and Adobe SoundBooth. You can mix, match slice and dice musical parts to create a clip of exactly the duration you need. It’s easier than you think and actually quite fun.

By: Des

Des — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 13:18:42 +0000

About narration:
The first course I have made was a great text&flash animation & video etc for medical sales. The second one was like a PPT with narration. Like an mbook, I would say today. To my surprise, sales reps preferred the 2nd. When I asked, why (a little bit disappointed – there was lot of energy invested into #1), they explained that the narrator gives a living example of the interpretation of the scientific knowledge, they can follow her building up their own interpretation.

By: tom

tom — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 19:39:09 +0000

@Doug: Good point. I’d add that we all start as amateurs and if we don’t try something different (even if it’s not initially perfect) or play around with ideas we’ll never get the skills we need to build better courses.

By: Doug Marlowe

Doug Marlowe — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 15:37:30 +0000

Music, because of its specific and far-reaching metaphorical powers, can name the unnamable and communicate the unknowable.
-Leonard Bernstein, “The Unanswered Question” p. 140, 1976

Done right, music can transform the experience. But, as we all have experienced the poor results of PowerPoint in the hands of amateurs, music will probably be poorly executed and eLearning will get another black eye.

Beware the Jabberwock…

Doug

By: tom

tom — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:32:01 +0000

@Jim: David has a couple of neat screencasts that show a little of what you're talking about. How to reduce on screen text: part 1 and part 2.

By: Jim Dickeson

Jim Dickeson — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 00:53:51 +0000

OK I’m straying off of Tom’s topic a bit, but I have some issues about narration versus no narration. And this is not just eLearning, but plain old in-person Powerpoint as well.

I agree that narration can conflict with onscreen text. Studies have shown that when the viewer tries to comprehend both simultaneously, overall comprehension suffers. Overall comprehension actually improves when the narration really does match the on-screen text, word for word. But that’s stupid. Which mean you should do away with one, or the other.

But let’s compare the two. On-screen text has some variation. There’s different fonts. Different sizes. Bold. Italics. Change the color. All caps if you want to scream. But that’s kind of it.

Narration – the real human voice, not the text-to-speech kind – has an infinite range of inflections, volumes, fast, slow, stressed, relaxed; and let’s not forget silence and pregnant pauses. These things can convey a wealth of information that just isn’t possible in on-screen text. In fact, the on-screen text is just about as lifeless as that text-to-speech stuff. So narration wins, hands down, in my book. Besides, if you chose to do away with the narration, then you may as well publish a book. Why even bother with multimedia eLearning?

So do away with the on-screen text. Use imagery to support your narration in stead of verbosity to compete with it. A picture really does say a thousand words. And these two forms of information are something that the human mind can deal with simultaneously.

Powerpoint is a good tool, but it’s too often misused. The default is bullet point, bullet point, bullet point, bullet point. And most people fall right into that pattern. When I create Powerpoint, whether for in-person presentations or to later publish in Articulate, I always start with blank screens. And if I must have text, I limit it to two or three words presented at a time. That’s something the mind can handle at the same time as your narration.

By: David

David — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 21:44:16 +0000

@Debra – that’s a good point about file size. When audio is used for ambient purposes, it’s often ok to use a lower bit rate to reduce file size. Save the higher quality sizes for narration and drop the ambient down a bit.

Do you have any articles or blogs regarding your ongoing research? I’m sure many of us would be interested to follow your research.

David
Articulate