We have been teaching in online classrooms for decades now, and I still see faculty–many faculty–who take the files they create with their productivity suites and upload them for students. When they do this, they impose an unnecessary level of complexity on students. In some cases, they cannot open the files as they lack the necessary software. In some cases they must take multiple steps to download the file, then convert it to something they can open.
By using “universal” file formats, those that can be opened by all computing devices, faculty make accessing course materials much easier. I recommend it to all faculty. I do hear, “but that makes more work for me” frequently. I can’t imagine the hubris of one who is unwilling to take the few seconds necessary to make these copies and feels it is appropriate to distribute that work to their students to repeat over and over for every file.
Here is my standard “lesson” on universal file formats:
Today’s students are likely to log on to their online classrooms from smartphones or tablets (either iOS or Android), computers (Windows, Macintosh or even Linux), or Chromebooks. The operating systems on those devices manage different types of files differently. Depending on the details of what software was used to create the materials and the specific configuration of the devices used to visit the online classroom, students may find they are unable to open some files prepared by their teachers.
Faculty can avoid this by ensuring posting files in standard formats. These files can be viewed on any device without the need to install software or otherwise configure one’s device.
PDF for Word Processor Files
Word processing documents are very useful for many educational purposes. Once the file is ready to be shared with students, the author should save it as a portable document format (PDF). The PDF file can be checked for accessibility, and then posted in the online classroom.
Almost every device any student will use to log on to an online classroom will be capable of displaying PDF files without any configuration by the student. PDFs are often displayed in the web browser itself with makes for immediate viewing and the file can be printed for saved from within the browser.
PDF for Static Presentations
When faculty want to share PowerPoint presentations (or files created with Google Slides or any other presentation software) that have static pages (without animations, audio, or video), they should save these as PDF files as well.
If faculty add annotations to a PowerPoint file during a lecture, then those annotations can be saved when the file is exported as a PDF file.
PNG or JPG for Images
Every learning management system includes a html editor that allows faculty to create pages that are displayed with in the course page. When posting images (especially those that have been edited), the files should be exported as a PNG or JPG file, then embedded using the html editor in the LMS.
YouTube for Video
Video is one of the more challenging media to manage in online classrooms. By uploading video to YouTube, then linking (or embedding) the YouTube page, faculty can be sure the video will be viewable on any digital device. Further, faculty can take advantage of the automatic closed captioning on YouTube to make the work of preparing that feature easier.