How to Convert PowerPoint to SCORM in a Few Clicks

PPT presentations are a popular format for learning content, yet they have limited LMS support and in most cases, no tracking. If you want to make your slide deck accessible via an LMS and keep track of your learners’ progress, you will need to turn it into an LMS-friendly format like SCORM.

Before diving deep into how to convert a PowerPoint presentation to a SCORM course, let’s see what SCORM is all about.

SCORM Explained

SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) is an international standard for e-courses. You can create a course and publish it to SCORM and be sure that it will work in almost any learning management system (LMS).

In fact, SCORM is a list of technical requirements. There’s a description of the e-course structure and the principles of its communication with LMSs. All the training materials for one course are packed into a SCORM package, a .zip archive that contains files in a specific hierarchy.

SCORM allows you to set rules for how long a learner has to stay on a certain course section before they are allowed to progress, and how much time they need to spend on a course overall. Once a SCORM package is uploaded to your LMS, you can keep track of your learners’ progress, completion status, and assessment scores.

A Step-by-Step Walkthrough

This is how you can export a PPT file to a SCORM course with the iSpring Suite authoring toolkit. If you still don’t have it, you can download iSpring Suite for free right now.

1. Open iSpring Suite and select the Courses tab. Click on the Browse button to open your PPT presentation.

2. Click Preview to make sure that your SCORM course looks good on all devices, including a computer, smartphone, and tablet.

3. Hit the Publish button. You’ll see several destination tabs. To convert a PowerPoint presentation to SCORM, select the LMS tab.

Now, you can set up the publishing options. Enter a title for the course in the Project name field and specify the folder in which you want to save your course.

4. Set up the output options. Start by checking the box Use iSpring Play app on mobile devices if you want your users to be able to view a course on their smartphones and tablets without an internet connection.

Then move on to customizing a player. Click on Player on the iSpring Suite toolbar, and you’ll see that the adaptive Universal Player is set by default. You can design it to match your corporate style or design it around the topic of the course.

iSpring Suite offers a set of ready-made templates. You can use a built-in template or easily create your own. Simply select one of the templates, add/remove interface elements in the Layout section, set up the playback and navigation under the corresponding tab, customize the player colors, and edit labels and messages if necessary.

When publishing your presentation to SCORM, the size of the slides in the course will be the same as configured in the PowerPoint settings. To change the way your course will display in a browser, click on the link in the Size field, and choose the appropriate option.

Now, you can customize the quality settings. Select one of the ready-made presets, from high to low quality, or create your own by choosing the image, video, and audio compression by adjusting the quality slider.

You can also protect your SCORM course against unauthorized use. To do this, you can add a watermark that will appear on the slides, set a password, limit the time of the course display, or allow its playback only from a specific domain.

5. You can finally move on to customizing the learning course options. In the LMS profile field, choose the eLearning standard (SCORM 1.2 or SCORM 2004) that your system supports.

Click on the Customize button to change your course name, lesson title, and identifier, and add a description and keywords.

By hitting Customize in this window, you can also change your progress and completion settings. Select the report status to the LMS and specify the minimum number of slides a learner must view to complete the course

6. After you save the changes, click on Publish. You’ll get a ZIP file ready for upload to any SCORM-compliant LMS.

iSpring Suite is not just a PowerPoint to SCORM converter. It’s a complete authoring toolkit that allows you to create slide-based courses with quizzes, conversation simulations, screencasts, video lectures, and interactions, and publish them to SCORM and other eLearning formats.

Give iSpring Suite a free 14-day test drive and explore all its features right now.