Turning course notes into slides with AI

Most course slides start life as notes. You write down everything you want to say, copy it onto slides, and end up with dense walls of text that learners try to read while you talk. Neither the reading nor the listening works well, and the lesson feels longer than it is.

AI is useful here because the job is mostly restructuring. It can pull a single idea out of each paragraph, move the detail into speaker notes and suggest a visual for each slide. Presentation tools with built-in AI can then turn that plan into a first draft deck. Your role is to decide what the learner needs to see and to check that nothing true got lost on the way.

Separate the script from the screen

The most important step happens before any design tool opens. Your notes contain two different things: what you will say and what learners need to see while you say it. Good slides show far less than you say. They carry a single idea, a key term, a diagram or an example, while the explanation lives in your voice.

A general assistant such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini or Microsoft Copilot can do this separation well if you ask clearly. The fuller your brief, the better the split; briefing AI like a new assistant explains why context matters so much.

Below are my notes for a course lesson. The learners are [describe your learners]. The lesson will be a recorded video of about [length] minutes. Turn the notes into a slide plan.

For each slide give: a short headline that states the point, no more than [number] words of on-screen text, speaker notes containing the explanation I will say aloud, and a suggestion for one visual (a diagram, photo, example or screenshot). One idea per slide. Keep my wording in the speaker notes wherever possible, and flag any part of my notes you left out.

[paste your notes]

The last instruction matters. AI sometimes drops a caveat or merges two ideas to make a slide tidier. Asking it to list what it left out makes those decisions visible so you can overrule them.

What a good slide plan looks like

Tomasz runs a calligraphy guild, and one lesson covers nib angles. His notes run to two pages. A good slide from the plan might look like this:

• Headline: Hold the nib at the same angle for every stroke.
• On-screen text: Consistent angle, consistent letters.
• Visual: Two versions of the same word side by side, one with a steady angle and one with a wandering angle.
• Speaker notes: His explanation of why the angle changes stroke thickness, and his tip about checking it against a guide sheet.

Compare that with his original slide, which held six bullet points and a paragraph. The new slide gives learners one thing to look at while he explains the rest.

Choosing where to build the deck

Once the plan is right, you can build slides by hand or let a presentation tool create a first draft. Microsoft Copilot in PowerPoint, Gemini in Google Slides and Canva's AI features can all generate slides from a prompt or pasted text, with varying control over layout. Standalone AI presentation apps also exist. Tools change often, so try two on the same slide plan and see which gives you the cleanest starting point with the least fixing.

Whichever you use, feed it the finished slide plan rather than your raw notes. Tools that start from raw notes tend to recreate the wall of text you were trying to escape. Then apply your own template, fonts and colors so every lesson in the course looks consistent.

Visuals that teach rather than decorate

AI tools love adding decorative images: a stock photo of a person at a laptop, an abstract glowing shape. These add nothing and pull attention away from the point. For teaching slides, the most useful visuals usually are:

• Diagrams that show a process, a comparison or a relationship.
• Real examples, such as a photo of the finished result or a screenshot of the actual screen.
• Before-and-after pairs, like Tomasz's two words.

Image generators such as Midjourney, Adobe Firefly or those built into your presentation tool can help with scene-setting images or simple illustrations. Check each one closely, because generated images often contain garbled text, extra fingers or objects that could not exist. If you use them across a course, keep a consistent style, as described in a style guide for image prompts. And check the tool's terms on commercial use before an image goes into a paid course.

Review before you record

Go through the deck slide by slide before you press record:

• Accuracy. Read the speaker notes as if a stranger wrote them. Has anything been reworded into something you would not say?
• Completeness. Check the list of omissions the AI gave you and restore anything that matters.
• Readability. Use large text, strong contrast and no information that relies on color alone.
• Alt text. If you share the slides as a download, add short descriptions for the images.
• Rehearsal. Talk through the deck once. Slides that feel awkward to speak to usually need splitting or cutting.

For the design principles that make slides easier to learn from, see course slides that do not put learners to sleep.

Your next deck

1. Pick one lesson with notes that already exist.
2. Run the slide plan prompt and read the list of omissions.
3. Edit the plan until each slide carries one idea and the notes sound like you.
4. Build a draft in two presentation tools and keep the one that needs less fixing.
5. Replace decorative images with diagrams, examples or before-and-after pairs.
6. Review for accuracy, readability and alt text, then rehearse once before recording.

After two or three lessons you will have a slide plan prompt and a template you trust, and each new deck will take a fraction of the time.