Seeing a new light with PowerPoint

Since commencing my EPL, I have witnessed the use of PowerPoint in the classroom and by my observations, the students have engaged both positively and not so positive. I have always embraced PowerPoint and it's ability to demonstrate information in a visual means to assist the learning process. Over the past couple of days I have been designing a PowerPoint presentation for a year 09 HPE class on the anatomy of the knee and have been spending extra time on discovering all the tools Powerpoint has to offer. I have had previous experience with Powerpoint and have always thought I was confident in designing a presentation. However, designing a presentation with Kearnsley & Sniderman (1999) theory of Relate-Create-Donate approach made me realise that my previous presentations were just an electronic version of the chalk and talk teaching method. When commencing my presentation, I realised I was simply typing words onto the slide and adding some transition effects to make it interesting. Since commencing this course and learning how to use avatars, glogs and embedded video to present information It is now obvious that a PowerPoint presentation should offer more than words on a slide in order to engage students. Therefore following the Relate-Create -Donate approach towards my presentation, I have completely redesigned my slides to firstly ensure my presentation provides an authentic learning experience and secondly to ensure the presentation reflects a design that students can relate to as a group and finally to ensure the presentation reflects a topic that students have interest in.
In Summary, it is evident that although Powerpoint has been used for many years and is easily accessible, using a PowerPoint presentation in the classroom does not automatically provide a positive learning experience. It is essential that when using Powerpoint, both the presentation and its content must reflect authenticity, originality and an engagement focus.

Kearsley G, Shneiderman B (1999), Engagement Theory: A framework for technology-based teaching and learning. http://home.sprynet.com/~gkearsley/engage.htm.