Powerpoint Tips

Nothing can ruin a presentation like a poorly done slideshow.  Upon reading the Powerpoint articles, I was reminded of presentations I've given in the past.  I've definitely made some of the mistakes mentioned in the websites.  What can I say- making an interesting and informative slideshow is difficult!  But the websites were very helpful and had a ton of advice on how to make an excellent slideshow.

Here are my five points on what it takes to make a stellar slideshow:

1. Design- Part of giving an excellent slideshow is in the presentation.  Slideshows are visual experiences and giving your audience something captivating or interesting to look at is crucial in keeping them interested.  Use color and graphics effectively, in a way that compliments the subject and tone of the slideshow.  At the same time, keep them simple and easy to read- don't clutter the slide with so much visual imagery that they're impossible to read or understand. Design your slides carefully, giving them a similar appearance to tie them all together but having some variation.  

2. Keep the text to a minimum- Slides should reinforce dialogue but should not be identical.  When giving a presentation, it's usually not very helpful to simply repeat on a slide what you're saying in your speech.  The audience can both read and hear, and giving them the same information twice will bore them.  Rather, you should make sure that your slides support what you say but do not simply mirror it.  If you're going to have text on your slides, keep it short and put only what you need- text is uninteresting to look at.  Keep your slides simple and visual and then elaborate upon what they show verbally.

3. Choose an appropriate font- Sure, everyone loves a cute font, but could you really understand a slideshow if all of the text were written in calligraphy or "curlz"?  Your audience needs to read the slide quickly, as you don't want to spend too much time on a single slide, so you want your font to be clear.  Try picking a font that is both stylish and easily read, but remember, clarity is most important.     

4. Use Pictures- Audiences like being given something to look at.  A slideshow of slides with nothing but text is visually uninteresting.  Be sure to include some pictures to keep the slideshow interesting.  Use them effectively and strategically to demonstrate your points or further explain what you're saying.  Using photographs of your subject will help the audience understand and stay interested.  Graphs are useful visual tools as well- a well made graph can help support your points.  You might even consider putting a video into your slideshow, if appropriate- remember, audiences are needy and can't be sustained with text alone.

5. Simplicity is a virtue- Despite all I've just said, don't feel the need to overly clutter your slides with photos, graphs, and other visual aids at the expense of clarity.  Keep your slideshow straightforward and keep your slides simple and easy for the audience to understand.  

Those are my tips for an excellent Powerpoint!  

CLT Field Trip

This week the class took a field trip to the AT&T Center for Learning and Technology in the Coates Library.  It was my first time to visit the center and I was rather surprised by how much useful equipment and software there was accessible to me.  The center is a large area downstairs filled with both Mac and PC computers, scanners, and a variety of multimedia software for creating and editing.  I never realized just how much equipment was available for students to use.  I could use the software there for a plethora of class projects.  For example, I have an assignment in my Acting 1 class involving audio recording, and the software in the center would be incredibly useful for that.  I think it could be equally helpful for our class as well- the Digital Audio Lab and Media Presentation Lab could assist with creating presentations for class!  In addition, the Innovation Studio is dedicated to educating students and faculty alike about using school software and could assist me with any troubles I have with software.  With all of it's high tech equipment and software available for students, the center could be helpful for virtually any creative project, whether academic, artistic, or personal.  I'll definitely be returning to the center soon!

Excel!

Learning about Microsoft Excel these last few weeks has been invaluable to me- I'm stunned by how much I never knew about Excel.  Sure I knew how to make pie graphs and charts, but I'd never before used the formula feature of Excel.  Excel's ability to calculate values based on the information given is truly remarkable; it's much more than simply a calculator, it's an advanced, sophisticated program that seems capable of mind-reading at times.  Excel could be used in a myriad of ways.  I imagine it would be incredibly useful to research in any academic field as a method of sorting and interpreting observations and results.  Excel would be useful in business as well; it could calculate and sort profits, losses, taxes, revenue, and, as we've done in class, even catalog the performance of different employees or groups.  Excel could be used to keep track of stocks, to predicts odds in a game of chance, even to arrange a guest list for a party.  Its uses are virtually limitless.  In the past I have used Excel exclusively to create graphs for presentations, but I have no doubt in the future I will be using it to its full potential.  I feel regretful for all of the time I've spent not knowing all that Excel had to offer.  Three cheers for Microsoft Excel!

Chris Nolan Presentation!

Chris Nolan's presentation on Thursday was incredibly helpful.  He spoke about good and bad internet sources and how to distinguish between them.  We learned about how search engines, Google in particular, list their search results.  Google does not accept payment in order to move a website up the list of search results, though there is a separate column dedicated to this.  Google sorts its results by how many times each website has been linked to or cited in a separate website.  We were surprised and saddened to find that in some cases, such as the search topic "Martin Luther King," racist, outrageously delusional results appeared near the top (the search topic "Jew" yields very similar results).  This demonstrates that the order of websites in a Google search is not linked to the legitimacy or factuality of the sites.  It's important to remember this, so as not to simply assume the top results are also the most useful.  

Chris Nolan also talked about how to search most effectively for sources.  Something he showed us that surprised me was a chart displaying the difference between results found on Yahoo and Google.  I never knew that Google and Yahoo had such different search results.  I've been a consistent user of Googles for all of my internet-using life, aside from those childhood days of Yahooligans, and and it has never really occurred to me to look outside the bubble of Google.  In the future if I have trouble finding what I'm looking for, I'll definitely broaden my horizons and try a different search engine.       

A Picture's Worth A Thousand Words

The image above is one of many photographs doctored and altered by the order of Joseph Stalin during his rule of the USSR.  I chose it because I find the history and politics of the Soviet Union fascinating.  At home I own a book called The Commissar Vanishes that contains other before-and-after photos of Stalin's political enemies.  

Political dissent in the Soviet Union was met with severe punishment, usually in the form of exile or execution.  When Stalin had his more prominent enemies exiled or executed, he would strategically have their images removed from photographs.  By doing this Stalin would effectively erase the memory of them, removing them from history.  The man removed from the photo above is Leon Trotsky, a prominent member of the Communist Party who fell out of favor with Stalin and was subsequently exiled.  Stalin removed Trotsky's image from a variety of photographs in order to eliminate him from public memory.  With Trotsky removed from records and photographs, it became difficult to prove that he existed at all and easy for Stalin to claim that he didn't.  This instance of altering photographs is clearly harmful.  Through this act of censorship Stalin eliminated all criticism of his actions by removing those who criticized him from the country and from history itself.  Stalin was able to remove proof of their existence and counted on a scared and confused populace not to ask questions.