Effective digital learning starts with purposeful design and clear intent.
SMART Capture is a design-led approach to creating purposeful digital learning experiences that help students stay engaged, keep up, and catch up. Rather than focusing on recording content, it focuses on designing digital assets that support understanding, application, and meaningful engagement.
When used well, digital capture moves beyond long recordings and slide-heavy delivery. It becomes a structured, flexible learning experience that supports diverse learners, reduces cognitive overload, and creates clear pathways through learning. Without thoughtful planning, however, digital materials can quickly become overwhelming, difficult to navigate, and disconnected from learning outcomes.
At the University of Portsmouth, our purpose is to design rich, meaningful learning experiences that empower students, not to mass-deliver information. That means we must now take a step back, reassess our practices, and re-imagine what effective content capture really looks like. With the digital tools now available, we can transform content capture into something far more valuable: a dynamic, context-rich process that moves us from passive content delivery to purposeful, interactive learning design.
The purpose of this guide is to help us make that shift and introduces a new framework - SMART Capture. One that supports students not just to engage, but also to keep up and catch up when life gets in the way. And one that reflects our values as educators who care deeply about accessibility, inclusion, and impact.
SMART Capture embraces the principles of our institutional approach to learning and teaching, grounded in the simple premise of Teach Well, Consistently Well - every student, every session, every time.
The Five Principles of SMART Capture
The SMART Capture guide introduces five core principles to help staff design digital assets that are purposeful, engaging, and accessible. These principles provide a practical framework for planning, creating and refining digital learning so that both staff and students can use digital resources with confidence.
Why This Matters
Digital capture is more than a technical process it is a key part of creating flexible, inclusive learning environments. When designed carefully, SMART Capture helps students stay connected to learning, revisit difficult ideas, and build confidence in their understanding.
SMART Capture applies equally to:
- Created assets that you, colleagues or students record (e.g. explainers, walkthroughs, reflections)
- Curated assets from elsewhere (e.g BoB, YouTube, podcasts, Creative Commons materials)
An asset is purposeful. It is created or curated with a clear pedagogical intention. It is designed to support active engagement, not just passive consumption. Whether it's a short video recorded in Panopto. a clip curated from YouTube, or a documentary sourced from Box of Broadcasts (BoB), a learning asset earns it's place by what it helps students do with what they have learned.
Assets can be used in asynchronous learning or as standalone resources in an online course or as part of an active blended learning strategy, where they complement in-person activity. In either case, effective and purposeful design is key.
What matters most is not who made it or how long it is, but how well it supports the intended learning outcomes and how students are expected to engage with it.
Used well, SMART Capture creates learning experiences that feel purposeful, accessible, and genuinely supportive helping students not just access information, but engage with it in meaningful ways.