my first power point

You can click on the picture, or here to see my first power point presentation. Ever.

I have mixed feelings about power point, especially in the classroom. So many times, in the classes that I've been a student in, powerpoint presentations somehow make class less interesting -- perhaps because most of my teachers who have used power point in the classroom have had a tendency to read their lecture directly from the slides without adding much other information. I think I'm a capable reader, and I would rather read the slides for myself, at my faster reading pace, than have them be read to me. So far in my academic career, I have not seen powerpoint used in any other capacity. I suppose this could be helpful for visual learners, however, by satisfying their need to look at the information being presented to them, while other students still have the option of hearing the information presented in the lecture.

When one of my classmates heard that I hated powerpoint, she started listing some of the different ways that she has used powerpoint in the classroom, in more interactive ways than what I've experiences. I think that it can be an effective tool, when used in an engaging manner -- it seems that so far, I've encountered a lot of "user error" and what I might deem "false integration" of powerpoint into the classroom. Creating interactive games, for review purposes, seems like a new and different use of powerpoint to me, but one that could make common review games seem a lot more authentic in the classroom setting. I think I would like to learn how to make some sort of "choose your own adventure" with powerpoint -- but I'm so limited in my knowledge of what can be done with powerpoint that I don't know if this is possible!

Since making my own powerpoint presentations is so new to me, I think that, at least at first, using it in my classroom will be a challenge. It will take time for me to learn the tricks and tips for quickly creating interesting presentations and also for learning how to create more interactive presentations. I think that interaction is extremely important in the classroom, and I hope that powerpoint can be a tool that promotes interaction, rather than just make lecturing more convenient.