lecture.studio
Guides
How-to articles for instructors and speakers: lecture decks from readings, Marp Markdown, speaker notes, exports, syllabi.
How many words for a 5, 10 or 15 minute presentation
Word counts and slide counts by length: the words-per-minute range that fits a talk, what to cut when you overrun, and how to rehearse against the clock.
A presentation rubric that is fast to grade and fair
A four-criterion rubric for student presentations: level descriptors, weights, group talks, timing penalties, and feedback during the session.
Poster or oral presentation: which to choose at a conference
Poster or talk at a conference: what each format is good at, how the audience differs, and how to prepare either without duplicating the work.
Marp vs Beamer, Quarto and Pandoc for lecture slides
Marp compared with LaTeX Beamer, Quarto and plain Pandoc for teaching: what each needs installed, what the source looks like, and what the export keeps.
Marp not working: theme, images, preview and export fixes
The Marp problems that cost the most time: an unstyled deck, images missing from the PDF, HTML that disappears, a stale preview, and export failures.
Marp text align, margins and scoped styles for one slide
Centre or right-align text in Marp, change padding and image margins, and style a single slide with a scoped style block and CSS variables.
Install Marp: CLI, VS Code and Docker on Mac, Windows, Linux
Install Marp: npx or npm for the CLI, the VS Code extension, the Docker image, what Chrome is for, and the Node upgrade that breaks a global install.
Marp auto-scaling: fit headings, code that shrinks, overflow
How Marp scales text: the fit comment on a heading, code blocks that shrink to fit, the @auto-scaling theme flag, and what to do when a slide overflows.
Learning outcomes and Bloom taxonomy verbs for a course
Writing learning outcomes that survive review: the sentence pattern, Bloom verbs by level, how many to write, and the outcome-to-assessment map.
Job talk slides: structure, length and the questions after
Building an academic job talk: what the committee listens for, a slide structure that fits 45 minutes, and the backup slides worth preparing.
Images for lecture slides: licences, sources and attribution
Where to find images you may legally use in lecture slides, what Creative Commons licences allow, how to attribute them, and the cases they miss.
How to record a lecture: setup, audio, slides and length
Recording a lecture: microphone and screen setup, recording slides with narration, the minimum editing worth doing, and where the file goes.
Flipped classroom slides: record this, keep that for class
Splitting a lecture for a flipped classroom: what goes in the pre-class deck, what the in-class slides do, and the students who did not prepare.
Charts in lecture slides: which chart, how to label it
Data on lecture slides: choosing the chart type, labelling it for the back row, cutting a paper figure to one message, and the check before class.
Too much text on slides: the fix is the claim, not the font
Why lecture slides fill with text, where it should go instead (handout, notes, next slide), a rule for what a slide can carry.
Presenter view on one screen: PowerPoint, Keynote, Marp
How to see your notes and the next slide without a second display in PowerPoint, Keynote, Google Slides and Marp HTML decks, and when one screen is enough.
Practice questions from your readings: a method that cites
How to write practice and exam questions from the readings rather than the slides: question types, a source per question, a difficulty ladder, answer keys.
How to organize course materials: one folder per week
A course folder layout that survives several terms: numbered week folders, decks as text, images beside the deck, sources in three scopes, syllabus at top.
Marp vs Slidev vs reveal.js for lecture slides
Three Markdown slide tools compared for teaching: file format, setup, notes, PDF export, columns, offline use. Marp tested on 4.5.
Marp vs PowerPoint for teaching: which to use for lectures
A comparison for instructors: where text-based Marp decks win (versioning, search, regeneration), where PowerPoint wins (layout, animation, templates).
Video, iframes and SVG in Marp slides: what renders where
Embedding video, a web page and SVG in Marp: the video tag works by default, iframes and inline SVG need the html option, SVG files work as images.
Two-column layouts in Marp: flex, grid, tables, bg split
Four ways to put two things side by side on a Marp slide: a table, a bg split, flex columns, a grid; when each fits, and which Marp versions render divs.
Marp transitions and animations: fade, slide, fragments
Slide transitions in Marp with the transition directive, the 33 built-in names, per-slide overrides, custom keyframes, fragmented bullets.
A Marp title slide: lead class, no page number, background
A Marp title slide: the lead class, hiding the header, footer and page number, a background image or colour, name and affiliation.
Marp tables: syntax, alignment, size, centring, contents
Tables in Marp slides: pipe syntax, alignment with colons, sizing with CSS, centring, when a table is too wide.
Marp slide size and aspect ratio: 16:9, 4:3, 4K, custom
Setting the slide size in Marp: the size directive (16:9 default, 4:3), extra sizes such as 4K or A4 declared in a theme with @size, the PDF page.
Mermaid diagrams in Marp: a working engine for HTML and PDF
Marp has no built-in Mermaid. Two routes that work: pre-render diagrams to SVG, or a marp-cli engine that renders mermaid fences in HTML.
Math in Marp slides: KaTeX, MathJax and the syntax
Equations in a Marp deck: inline and display math, KaTeX or MathJax via the math directive, aligned equations, macros, sizing, and checks before export.
Marp in VS Code: preview, export, themes, settings
Marp for VS Code for lecture decks: preview, export to PDF, PPTX and HTML, custom themes via markdown.marp.themes, HTML and math settings, and its limits.
Marp in Obsidian: the two plugins and what to expect
Writing Marp slides inside Obsidian with the Marp Slides and Obsidian Marp plugins: preview, export to PDF, PPTX and HTML, custom themes.
Marp images: sizes, backgrounds, splits and filters
The image syntax Marp adds to Markdown: width and height, background images and sizing, bg left and right splits, multiple backgrounds, filters, PDF traps.
How to hide or skip a slide in Marp (without a blank page)
Marp has no hide directive. What each workaround does in HTML, PDF and PPTX, why a hidden class leaves a blank page.
Marp header, footer and page numbers: directives that work
The header, footer and paginate directives in Marp, per-slide overrides, skip and hold for page numbers, images in the footer, and the CSS to move them.
Publish Marp slides on GitHub Pages with Actions or Docker
A workflow that builds every Marp deck in a repository to HTML and PDF on push and publishes on GitHub Pages, the Docker image.
Marp fonts: change the font family, use Google Fonts, embed
Setting the font in a Marp deck or theme, loading Google Fonts with an import, a local font with font-face, what the PDF export embeds.
Marp font size: the deck, one slide, tables and code
How to change the font size in Marp for the whole deck, one slide, headings, tables and code, the auto-fitting heading, and why smaller rarely fixes it.
Fit an image to a Marp slide: bg contain, sizes, fit text
Fitting an image to a Marp slide without cropping: bg contain, bg cover, w and h sizes, the split layout, fitting a heading.
Marp examples: six lecture decks and the patterns in them
Six complete Marp decks to open and edit (lecture, talk, seminar, thesis, course intro, blank) and the slide patterns each demonstrates.
Emoji in Marp: shortcodes, Twemoji images and offline PDFs
How Marp handles emoji: shortcodes, Unicode emoji turned into Twemoji images from a CDN, what that does to offline PDFs.
Marp colours: text, background, invert and dark themes
The color and backgroundColor directives for a deck or one slide, text over a darkened photo, the invert class in gaia and uncover.
Marp code blocks: syntax highlighting, size, style
Fenced code in Marp slides: highlight.js languages, sizing the block, splitting long listings, wrapping, theme colours.
marp-cli config, watch mode, server mode and engines
marp-cli beyond one command: a config file that holds the flags, watch mode, server mode for a folder of decks, preview windows, engines for plugins.
Center an image or text in Marp: three ways that work
How to center an image, a paragraph or a whole slide in Marp: a theme rule on the alt text, the lead class, a scoped style.
Markdown to slides: every way to convert, compared
Every way to turn a Markdown file into slides, from a browser tool to marp-cli, pandoc, Slidev and reveal.js: what each needs, what it outputs.
Markdown to PPTX: marp-cli, pandoc, python-pptx compared
Three ways to turn Markdown into a PowerPoint file, what each keeps (layout, editability, notes, tables), the commands, and which to pick for a lecture.
Lecture vs seminar vs tutorial: what each is for
The three formats of a university course, what each does that the others cannot, how to prepare and run each, and how the slides and materials differ.
Lecture handouts from the same sources as the deck
What a lecture handout is for, a structure that is not a slide printout, writing it from the claim list and readings, and keeping it in step with the deck.
An instructor guide for a lecture: plan the hour in blocks
What an instructor guide is, how it differs from speaker notes, and a one-page template: 20-minute blocks with a student output, a cut list, an extension.
How to structure a lecture: a shape that holds for an hour
A lecture structure that survives a room: an opening that states the claim, twenty-minute blocks with something students do, one spine.
How to start a lecture and how to end one
Openings that get a room's attention without a joke and closings that leave the point in the room: the first three minutes, the last five, the slides.
How to present a research paper: from PDF to a 15-min talk
A structure for presenting a paper at a conference or seminar: one claim, the figure that carries it, method as needed, limits before questions, counts.
How to prepare a lecture: sources, claims, deck, notes, hour
The order that makes preparing a lecture a routine: readings, claim list, the hour in blocks, the deck, then notes, handout and questions from one list.
How to cite sources in slides: per slide, footer, references
Where a citation goes on a slide, how short it can be, APA-style forms for claims, figures and quotations, the references slide, and the trail in Markdown.
How many slides for a 1-hour lecture (and 50 min, 2 h, 3 h)
A working rule for slide counts by lecture length, why lectures need fewer slides per minute than talks, what moves the number, and a check before class.
First day of class slides for a university course
What the course introduction deck contains and in what order: who you are, what the course is for, how it runs, schedule, assessment, policies.
Agenda and learning objectives slides: what to put on them
The two slides at the start of a lecture: an agenda that maps the blocks with what students will do.
Active learning in large lectures: five techniques
Techniques that work in a hall of 150: peer instruction with a vote, think-pair-share, the one-minute paper, the muddiest point, an exit ticket.
Accessible lecture slides: contrast, alt text, structure
Slides usable by students with low vision, colour-blindness and screen readers: contrast, size, alt text, colour as a second signal, headings, the handout.
Version control for lecture slides: git for a course folder
Why a course folder of Markdown decks belongs in git, a layout that works, what to commit and ignore, a weekly routine, and sharing with a co-instructor.
Updating a course for next semester without starting over
A routine for carrying a course into a new term: copy, re-date, review week by week against the old term, update the readings, and keep what worked.
A syllabus generator with dates: plan and reuse the schedule
How to build a syllabus with a dated weekly schedule, keep the dates in one place, and move the whole course to next term without retyping a single week.
Marp themes for lectures: built-in, custom CSS, house style
Which Marp theme to use for teaching, how to tweak one with a style block, how to write a custom theme CSS, and how to ship it with marp-cli and VS Code.
Breaks in a long lecture: blocks, timing and a countdown
How to split a two- or three-hour lecture into teaching blocks and breaks, the rhythms instructors use, keeping to them, and showing the break to the room.
AI slide generators for teachers: what to check first
Seven questions to ask an AI slide generator before using it for a course: citations, where files live, output format, notes, editing, privacy, lock-in.
Speaker notes in Marp: how to write and present them
Where speaker notes go in a Marp deck, how to see them while presenting, how long they should be, and a pattern for notes that help in the room.
Create slides from a PDF without losing the citations
How to turn a paper, a chapter or a report into a slide deck that still points back to the page each claim came from, by hand or with an AI assistant.
Marp tutorial for teaching: Markdown slides for lectures
Write lecture slides in Marp Markdown: front matter, slide separators, directives, images, gaia and uncover themes, custom CSS and a course template.
How to make lecture slides from your readings
A workflow for turning chapters, papers and handouts into a lecture deck that cites them: pick sources, outline, write, check, then notes and questions.
Export Marp to PDF and PPTX with marp-cli
The marp-cli commands for PDF, PPTX, editable PPTX, HTML and notes export, what each format keeps and loses, and how to script exports for a whole course.