1. Tricks and Traps for Using PowerPoint in Mathematics Lectures Todd Fadoir Berkley High School/CASA 2009 DACTM Fall Conference todd1@toddfadoir.com

2. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20092 Why I use PowerPoint It keeps me organized It keeps me from making arithmetic mistakes You can’t read my writing Easier for the teacher because you don’t have to write everything 5 times

3. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20093 Use MathType Great mathematics typesetting Great upgrade from Microsoft Equation Can save and reuse common expressions Current version 6.5 Academic price $57

4. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20094 Try MathType/Microsoft Eq’n

5. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20095 Use a white background I use “Pixels” as my default slide design

6. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20096 Keep your page uncluttered Make sure the writing is big enough to see from the back of the room

7. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20097 Show a little at a time Don’t overwhelm your students Use white rectangles to cover up MathType objects Use animations to remove the white rectangles

8. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20098 Use transparency to cheat Setting the transparency of the rectangles to 5%. Adjust your projector’s contrast so the students can’t see the faint ghost image Now you look like you know what you are talking about

9. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 20099 Use the border/animation trick

10. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200910 Scan pages from your book I have a cheap HP Printer/Scanner/Copier on my desk Use the crop tool to get the image appropriately sized Use the resize handles to get the images the right size Sacrifice one book so that you can scan easily

11. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200911 Steal from PDFs I use PDFs from the College Board in my AP classes Copy doesn’t always work Use Print Screen to put an image of the screen onto the clipboard Use Paste to bring the image into PowerPoint

12. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200912 Record your lectures I use Camtasia Studio from TechSmith to capture my lectures.  Academic price: $179 I use a Logitech USB Desktop Microphone  $22 from Amazon.com I post my lectures to my website: www.toddfadoir.com

13. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200913 Use TI-SmartView Huge projected calculator Students can see which keys you press Easy way to grab screenshots of the calculator’s display $130 from various vendors

14. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200914 Use a SmartBoard $$$ Natural teaching

15. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200915 Project on a white board Its nice to be able to write on your notes, graphs and equations

16. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200916 Write on your slides Write in digital ink on your slides Great for giving emphasis during the lecture

17. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200917 Use a tablet mouse Much more natural writing on your slides than using the mouse. I use the Wacom Bamboo Pen tablet $69 from wacom.com

18. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200918 Go to a particular slide Type in the slide number, then hit enter Put the slide numbers on each slide

19. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200919 Edit in front of the students Creating the presentation is an investment that pays dividends Make each year better by correcting errors Let the students see the process

20. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200920 Back-up your data There are only two kinds of hard drives in the world  Those that have crashed…  And those that are about to.

21. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200921 Revise Take advantage of year by year improvements

22. PowerPoint Trick and Traps, Todd Fadoir, 200922 Questions Contact: Todd Fadoir E-mail: todd1@toddfadoir.com