When Computers Leave Classrooms, So Does Boredom
There’s an article worth reading on The Chronicle of Higher Education’s web site. It’s titled “When Computers Leave Classrooms, So Does Boredom.”
It isn’t a rant against the use of PowerPoint in teaching, but it does try to get teachers away from an over-reliance on it. The article extensively cites the thoughts of José A. Bowen, a dean at Southern Methodist University. Here’s a brief summary of his approach:
More than any thing else, Mr. Bowen wants to discourage professors from using PowerPoint, because they often lean on the slide-display program as a crutch rather than using it as a creative tool. Class time should be reserved for discussion, he contends, especially now that students can download lectures online and find libraries of information on the Web. When students reflect on their college years later in life, they’re going to remember challenging debates and talks with their professors. Lively interactions are what teaching is all about, he says, but those give-and-takes are discouraged by preset collections of slides.
Later in the article there are examples of how to use PowerPoint not at a “crutch” but as a “creative tool.”
You can watch an interview of Bowen here.
Bowen makes an implicit distinction between learning information (through lectures aided by PowerPoint and other means) and learning how to think (through discussions, interaction, and active participation). It’s a distinction that every presenter should keep in mind.
Sometimes a presentation is all about presenting information. You just want your audience to know something — a new procedure or policy, the latest test results, the status of a project. And sometimes you want them to learn how to think — how to conduct an experiment, how to analyze data, how to select the best option.
You have to determine your goal — do you want to communicate information or help people think – before selecting the tools and methodology you use.
Tags: goal of a presentation, use of technology in a presentation, when not to use PowerPoint
November 19th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Dear Sir,
This type of information is needed. I need it to discover how to give better presentations and move into the area of talking to adults and away from my usual area of speaking with children and teenagers. I naturally gravitate towards being surprising and entertaining as a speaker, artistic, creative, spontaneous and detailed in facts, my style of speaking humour is partly that others laugh at my faux pas and I roll with it, while pressing on with my fact delivery and exploring depths of the topic I am passionate about and with to impress on people. I have a desire to influence others and sell my message. I have a desire to encourage people to act on it. I have in the past had a phobia about public speaking and I still find it hard learning to do it in different contexts. I struggle to feel valued in the different tasks I perform in my work that is what I am overcoming in order to speak to others. I get bogged down in detail while preparing a talk because of lack of confidence, great ideas come to me though. I wish to make the talk impacting even at the expense of decorum sometimes.
Thanks for this article.
You can write back to be with suggestions if you have time but I am sure you are very busy.
Liz Titterington
Student, Tabor Bible College, Ringwood East, Victoria,
Australia.
November 20th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Liz,
If you can speak to kids and teenagers, you can certainly talk to adults. (Profesional speakers stand in awe of their peers who speak to teenagers. It’s a rare talent.)
If you’re still working on building your confidence, consider joining a Toastmasters club. Go to http://www.toastmasters.org to find a club near you. Or look into a movement called “speaking circles.” You can find out more about them at http://www.speakingcircles.com.
Good luck.
Chris
December 5th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Great!!!