Presentation Week

Source: Denver Library; accessed on 9 April 2013

This week's activities have introduced us to the world of presentation-making. We were asked to look at the basics of PowerPoint, design presentation slides in Prezi and construct an online scrapbook in Glogster. It took a while, but I have managed to experience each one of these tools, develop initial feelings and form final opinions.

PowerPoint

PowerPoint is an easy-to-operate useful tool in any classroom. It helps the teachers to engage different types of learners with the use of still and moving images, written word and podcasts. I have come up with several ideas for the PowerPoint presentations, which could be used in my grade 6 classroom. The following presentation has been created for mass media (magazines) topic. 

Presentation2 from Urszula Cimoch

My feelings about using PowerPoint slides are rather positive. The Microsoft presentation tool is basic, however sufficient to engage and entertain knowledge-thriving students.
Nonetheless, I found it hard to embed a Youtube video in my presentation. I am using 2011 version of Microsoft on my Mac. Any suggestions on how to insert an online video in the slide? Does 2011 PowerPoint allow it? There are several Youtube converters on the web, KeepVid being one of the most popular ones, allowing to download the Youtube videos on your computer and then attaching them to the presentation. Although I find this method overly time-consuming. 
I would like to add that the PowerPoint presentation itself cannot maintain student's focus on given topic. It can overwhelm, therefore it is crucial to break the content into parts by allowing certain amount of time to engage in a topic-related activity. The presentation I have created is very simple, consisting of several basic slides. 

Prezi

What is Prezi? It is "a cloud-based presentation software that opens up a new world between whiteboards and slides"(here). Originating from Hungary, Prezi can be used as a story telling tool for presenting ideas on virtual canvas allowing users to zoom in and out chosen features of the presentation. 




After reading a large number of positive reviews on Prezi, I was expecting a divine encounter. I have to say, I was impressed with the visual side of it. Prezi has a whole range of features to offer, such as "zoom-in and -out" function, which PowerPoint lacks. Nevertheless, it has its weaknesses. I personally like to include more information in my presentations - this is where standard Microsoft tool comes in handy. Prezi "dislikes" large amounts of text, hence the result of my rather informative presentation are slightly messy in design.  Allowing for display of embedded media is a great strength of Prezi, however an inclusion of very little text did not convince me about its suitability for an hour-long lesson. I initially felt it would work well as an introduction to the topic or a brief conclusion. After further consideration I have realised that Prezi could well support oral presentation, within certain limits of free Prezi features.

Glogster

So, I have created my first Glog! I was pleased with the results of my work and thoroughly enjoyed every second of this interactive experience. Its slogan "Poster yourself" explains everything - this web-based application allows to create digital mish-mash of everything we want. I like the initial concept of chaos. Similarly to Prezi, Glogster supports multiple intelligences. According to Mayer and Moreno (2003) "recent technological advances through functional magnetic resonance imaging scans confirm a dual coding system through which visuals and text/auditory input are processed in separate channels presenting the potential for simultaneous argumentation for learning (...) People learn better from combining visuals with text and sound than through using either process alone".



Summary

I found that each one of the presentation softwares: PowerPoint, Prezi and Glogster, serves as a valuable teaching and learning tool. I like the theory behind Prezi suggesting that our ideas are not linear. Instead they consist of bundles of interconnecting concepts where every small element matters in creation of "the big picture". Glogster helps to design an interactive concept map, easier to develop. According to Read Write Think website, this tool can be used to "strengthen literacy skills by providing students with opportunities to integrate video, images, text and audio to present unified messages". As for the negatives of using both Prezi and Glogster,  I think that the problem lies in embedding online links, e.g. incorporating Youtube videos in the presentations, as Internet connection is required at all times. The classrooms without the Internet access may be highly disadvantaged, therefore it is important to work around these obstacles (if necessary). 

I feel that PowerPoint, Prezi and Glogster could easily be used at the same time to support each class. Perhaps, the best way to achieve this would be to base the class presentation on PowerPoint, with appropriate links to Glogster and Prezi, with the use of short activities for better engagement. What are your opinions?