Why I outlawed PowerPoint in my classes
Most
university students are familiar with
PowerPoint; however, they are not familiar with educating. When students work in groups, there is usually at least one member that is quite adept at assembling a PowerPoint presentation. Much time is spent finding the pictures that illustrate various points, inserting
The Far Side comics (surely some dinosaur, fly at a bar, or cows in a field have an interesting comment to make that is at least tangentially related to the subject matter), choosing pretty
backgrounds, and deciding upon nice
transition effects. Once the PowerPoint presentation is assembled, here is what happens.
In the likely scenario of the group not having arrived early to class to prepare the presentation, students come, disk in hand, to face a
notebook/
projector system that is neither plugged in nor booted. Time is spent waiting for the computer to start and selecting the right combination of buttons so that the projector displays the images on the notebook screen. About 10% of presentations end here due to problems with the hardware or software.
Next, the room is darkened as the images are projected onto the wall, or if we are fortunate, an actual projection screen. Presenters stand in the back of the room so they do not get in the way of the tiny fonts that completely fill the screen. In a monotone voice, undistracted by the students who are being lulled to sleep, whole presentations are read from the projected images. Students with their heads down on their desks, awaken briefly to
doodle on the 40 pages of PowerPoint handouts of
The Far Side comics and redundant text. Eventually, the lights are turned back on, and the class blinks back into
awareness. Was it just a
dream? A wonderful
sleepy time has been had by all.
Presentations do not have to be so bad. Since I outlawed PowerPoint and asked students to focus on
content and
teaching over .jpg files and transition effects, I have seen a tremendous improvement in the quality of student presentations. I ask students to
think of the presentation as a
learning experience for the class. What are they trying to teach? What will be the optimal method of getting their ideas across? How can they best ensure that the class will come away educationally
enriched by their presentation? I figure that once they have developed increased skills in being able to interest and educate their audience, then they can return to PowerPoint -- and what a PowerPoint presentation it will be!