Imagine having a syllabus that doesn’t just sit in your learning management system (LMS) collecting dust, but is actually one that your students can talk to, where they can ask questions about the syllabus and get answers.
Notebook LM is a fantastic tool that can turn your course materials into an AI learning partner your students can actually interact with.
What Is NotebookLM?
What is Notebook LM? NotebookLM is a Google product grounded in its sources. You get to pick and choose what sources you want to include, and NotebookLM only works with those sources. There is a way to search for sources, but primarily, if you’re thinking about your course, you just want to bring in sources you curated.
Bringing Course Materials Into NotebookLM
You can create notebooks for different purposes. For example, you can make a notebook for course-wide resources such as reference materials and your syllabus. You can create notebooks for each of your modules. After creating a notebook, you can share it with your students by adding shared links in your LMS for the appropriate modules. When students use it, they can interact with those materials. It basically turns passive content into active learning materials.
How Students Interact With Grounded Sources
Students can ask questions directly from the notebook sources. For example, “When are office hours?” or “What is the grading scheme for the course?” If you’re using it for your modular course material, they could be asking for it to create a glossary, or you could have created the glossary for them and added it in as a note in the studio.
The fact that you’re working just with these materials—which are called grounded sources—means students can interact with only those sources. This reduces misinformation. Students are dealing directly with the materials you’re providing, not getting something suspect from the internet.
Building Module-Based Notebooks
The nice thing about NotebookLM is that you can build notebooks around each of your modules. You can create notebooks around individual modules or weekly topics. You can bring in all kinds of different document types—everything from pasting text to PDFs to linking out to Google Drive assets such as Google Docs and Google Sheets. You can include audio files, image files, and link to YouTube videos.
Use Case Ideas
There are many different ways you can support your class by building and sharing your course materials with NotebookLM.
Use Case: The Interactive Syllabus
One use case is the interactive syllabus. By bringing in your syllabus, your assignment rubrics, reading lists, calendar notes, and assignment dates into one place, students can then ask questions. They could ask, for example, “Which week did we cover this particular topic?” and Notebook LM would report back the corresponding week. The nice thing about the notebook is that every student gets a clean look at the shared notebook. They can ask their own questions. It becomes an active learning tool.
Use Case: Enhancing Access to Course Materials
Another use case is modular course materials. You can upload all your readings, slides, examples, problem sets, etc. into a notebook. Students can then interact with them by asking for clarification, study suggestions, or anything else that comes to mind. They can request that quizzes be built or for alternative explanations. This is really powerful for students who are a little reluctant to ask those questions in class.
Use Case: Creating Learning Assets With Studio Tools
Another use case is creating learning assets for your students with the Studio tools. The Studio tools seem to be multiplying every couple of weeks. You have audio, auto-generated quizzes, flash cards, and lecture summaries. You can build study guides, glossaries, audio explainers, and video explainers. They have recently added slide decks, where you can build out slide decks and infographics—another set of amazing tools. This creates a multimedia, robust class that allows students to interact with materials based on their preferences. Everything you create with the Studio will appear automatically when students click on the shared link. Alternatively, you can download items made in the Studio and upload them to a course module.
Getting Started With Notebook LM
Getting started is pretty straightforward. Just open up notebooklm.google.com and create a notebook. Your notebook could be based on a module, a topic, or a research interest. Add the core documents. You can always add more, but you want to add the basics. Then, put a shared link into your LMS that points to this notebook. Encourage your students to check the notebook before emailing you. Have them try the notebook out first.
Building Your First Assets
The next step is to start building some assets—maybe a couple of quizzes they can review, some audio assets, or a slide presentation. Create a variety of activities for your students to interact with. Finally, ask your students how they are using NotebookLM; this will expand your knowledge.
Tips for Effective Use
Some things to keep in mind: keep your sources clean. You can always add, delete, or redo learning assets that you create. When students go to the shared notebook, they get the latest and greatest sources.
Using Notebooks in Office Hours
You can use these notebooks during your office hour sessions. Show them how this can be used and demonstrate its use.
Amplifying Instruction, Not Replacing It
A key point is that Notebook LM isn’t replacing your instruction—it’s amplifying it. It’s leveling up what you’re making available to your students. This is a way to make your content interactive so students can engage with it. They ask the questions they want to ask, how they want to ask them, and then they continue to respond based on what they’re seeing. Learning is dialog—dialog with the material. This is a potent tool.
Students Can Build Their Own Notebooks
And your students can build their own notebooks, and you can teach them how to do that. I encourage you to check it out.
