Effective PowerPoint© Presentations Julia Harbeck Sarah Cheverton

Educational Objective Drives Technology What is your educational objective for using a PowerPoint presentation? In-class Online What do you want your students to take away from your class? PPT should _________, not replace lecture while in-class.

Benefits of Using PPT (Cleland, 2001) What do you think are the benefits of PPT presentations? Multimedia: Animation, video and sound Links to the WWW: Simple access to other resources. Editing: Can easily update Ask question, “What are the benefits of using ppt as opposed to overheads or slides?” Write answers on board.

Benefits (Cleland, 2001) Distribution: Printing or exporting to WWW Cost: Low cost, assuming projection facilities are available Non-linear: Have capability of breaking away from linear presentation of materials to non-linear organization models. Non linear: For example, students need to learn some material simultaneously, not one step at a time, or chronologically. When a person gets a cold, don’t several things start to happen at once?

Disadvantages (Cleland, 2001) With a partner, come up with a list of 4 characteristics of PPT that you think are disadvantages of its use in a classroom setting. Lack of interactivity: Teacher no longer interacts with the media. Promotes ________ learning. Resolution: Best resolution is 1024 X 768 but 35 mm slides are 4000 X 3000. Brightness: Room lights must be dimmed which promotes _________ and reduced __________. Material can’t be altered during class like it can with a blackboard.

Disadvantages (Cleland, 2001) Pacing: PPT slides can be displayed very quickly, leaves illusion that the pace is too __________. Distractions: Some get too carried away with bells and whistles and forget the __________ _________of the presentation Linear straight jacket: Although have the ability to do non-linear presentation, can get locked into linear mind-set

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) Develop a visual __________ for your presentation, keep it in front of you throughout development. Use sound and video only for __________ purposes. Look for relevant ways to provide “___________ _______”. Develop a visual representation for your presentation. PPT can provide a structured framework for the lesson content. Consider topic, goals, objectives, flow of material. Create a storyboard on paper first. Do structure and content first then add color, text, audio, video. Revise lesson design as develop ppt. Use sound and video only for educational purposes. Don’t use glitz for the sake of glitz. Put educational objectives first. Look for relevant ways to provide “Learning Cues”. Learning cues are like using the same color text or a particular icon when referring to a specific topic.

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) Pre-select a standard sans-serif font for clarity and readability Serif is the little tail added at the end of letters, Times New Roman. This is Times New Roman. See the little tails? Sans serif means without the tails, Arial. This is Arial. Notice the plain block type lettering. 4. Pre-select a standard sans-serif font for clarity and readability. A maximum of two different fonts per presentation, one for headings and one for the body of the text is better for viewing.

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) Consider the size of the room when choosing font size. > 200 seats = Headings: 42 point; Main text: 36 point < 200 seats = Headings: 36 point; Main text: 28 point < 50 seats = Headings: 32 point; Main text: 24 point 5. In addition to having the right size font, will also need to consider the brightness of the projector. These may vary from room to room.

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) For maximum effect choose predominantly _________ case letters. Preview the effect of your chosen colors: Have no more than ___ regions of color Be consistent with your colors Consider the cultural significance of color Text color should complement and be _________ from background color If you grade colors (light to dark) the intensity should __________ as you move to the bottom of the frame. Consider the psychological effect of color. 6. For maximum effect choose predominantly lower case letters. Preview the effect of your chosen colors: Have no more than 4 regions of color Be consistent with your colors Consider the cultural significance of color for example, red, white and blue. Text color should complement and be distinguishable from background color If you grade colors (light to dark) the intensity should darker as you move to the bottom of the frame. Show gradient somewhere Consider the psychological effect of color. Bright colors project energy, pastels are more delicate, blues and greens are cool, reds and oranges are hot. Red is an anxiety producing color. Colors may look different on your monitor than on the screen. In large lecture rooms, colors appear to be darker. In small rooms, they appear lighter. If you have trouble controlling the lighting and are in a room with dark walls, use blue as a background color.

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) When choosing build (movement within a slide) and transition (movement between slides) effects, consider effect on audience learning. 1 sec. Transition between slides. Choose pictures and clip art that enhance your presentation message. Know what version of PPT is on the machine where you will be doing the presentation. Use builds to reinforce your points and control pace. Dim previous points. Can use builds for question answer format. Use a single, simple, one second transition between slides to diminish the student’s perception that the presentation is going too quickly. Make a concerted effort not to have too many slides. Use illustrations to support, reinforce, or add useful variation…don’t use them as decoration. Limit the number of pictures on each frame; avoid covering text; choose pictures, audio, video relevant to the topic. When adding objects to the slide, create a path for the eye, divide space in an interesting way. Talk to a graphic designer or artist for advice. If you are traveling, save your ppt as a “show”. This will package it as a complete read only program and you won’t have to worry if the computer has ppt on it or whether the version of ppt can read yours. Older projectors only show 640 x 480 and 256 colors, which will affect your presentation.

Twelve Tips for Effective PPT Presentations (Cleland, 2001 & Holzl, 1997) Always have a back-up: transparencies, handouts, web-site Practice. What are some tips you’ve found useful that we haven’t covered here? Sometimes it is difficult to find an overhead projector, so need other types of backups. If you are using audio and video files, it is best to save them to a cd rather than try and embed them. The ppt presentation will read the files from the cd or you can download them onto the presentation computer. Will run faster from the computer than from the cd. You will have to set up your presentation to find the files on the new machine. If possible, practice your presentation. Break the monotony of only using ppt by switching to the blackboard, overhead, physical demonstration, or going online.

Examples of Bad PPTs

Inserting Audio When would you want to run a sound file? Here is a sound file: See Handout

Inserting Video Can you think of a topic in your course where showing a video would be beneficial? See Handout Here is a video clip:

Narrating a PPT presentation When would you want to narrate a presentation? See Handout

Active Learning Fill-in-the-blank: Provide print-outs or have them bring print-out to class if online. Don’t provide every little detail in the presentation-require that students _______ listen, take notes. Mix activities in with PPT. Can ask questions and list answers in PPT

Posting Online If post online, determine why. Study guide? Include blanks? Could make speaker notes available if online. If save as an html, save for Netscape and Internet Explorer. Can also save as a ppt Will display in IE window. Netscape, opens in PPT If no PPT, then can’t view in Netscape

Other Sources http://www.uwlax.edu/itlc/PPT/intermed/sld001.htm http://www.irvingisd.net/technology/powerpoint/Default.htm Holzl Cleland

Summary Let educational objectives be primary concern. Follow basic guidelines. Err on the side of simple. Design differently for Online as opposed to in-class presentation. Engage students whenever possible.

Questions?