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PowerPoint Presentation

PowerPoint in the Classroom | Assignment | Tech specs/guidelines | Example | Tutorials

Using PowerPoint in the Classroom

Learning to use PowerPoint is reasonably straightforward. But just how do practicing teachers use this tool in their classroom? Here's a brief but helpful guide to provided by the Tuscaloosa Public School in Alabama for their teachers that could really help you think about this more concretely. This might get your thinking started about your own presentation.

Assignment

Create a presentation that teaches us something about a selected topic. You may fulfill this assignment either by making a presentation in ONE of three places:

1) Our class on the scheduled date (see syllabus--"PowerPoint Presentations" in the topic column).
2) Your current placement (make arrangements for me to attend or make arrangements to have your presentation videotaped)
3) Another of your Pacific U courses (e.g. Daniel Duarte's Learning Communities). Note that you must AUTHOR the presentation for your group, not simply participate in the group's presentation. Co-author efforts between 2 people are acceptable as long as there is clear evidence that each of you independently knows how to create presentations using the software.

  • You may use an assignment that you turned in earlier in our program. Simply make sure that it meets the assignment specifications listed below. If it does not, you may edit your work and update your previous assignment. For example, make sure that you include a graphic from the Internet and that you have a link to its source.

If you are selecting a topic to present to us in class, I recommend that you relate it to your work sample. If you haven't yet decided what your work sample topic will be, then select a topic you might present in your current placement. If that still doesn't work, then consider a topic that you might teach one day in your own classroom and that you would like to help your classmates learn more about.
 

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Technical specifications and presentation guidelines

For presentations given in class:

1. Each presentation should be about 4 minutes. 5 minutes is the maximum to allow everyone time to present.  Minimum of 6 slides presentation.
2. You must include at least one image from the Internet in your presentation, properly cited. REQUIRED: Reference the URL of the graphic somewhere in your presentation. Many choose to put this reference below the image; others make a list of image sources at the end of their presentation.
3. Include transitions and animations and format your slides so they aren't just black text on a white background.
4. Include the title and your name on a title slide.
5. REQUIRED: Include the specific part Curriculum Goals, Content Standard, AND Benchmark (grade level appropriate) from the Oregon Standards if your presentation is intended for a K-12 audience. I suggest you do this on a separate slide, and make it the last one in your presentation. You don't need to discuss it in your presentation--you are simply documenting which goal/standard/benchmark your presentation addresses.
6. Print out your presentation, 6 slides to a page. Give a copy of that printout to me so I can make comments on the printout during your presentation.
7. The presentation can be created on either a Mac or a Windows machine. It will be shown in class on our Mac machine. I strongly suggest you view it on the Mac before presenting it on the Mac. There are some interesting cross platform issues especially dealing with fonts. I suggest you stick with rather generic fonts if you are authoring on one platform but displaying on another.
8. Save the presentation on a floppy disk, a zip disk, or in the student folder. From there we can upload it onto the teaching machine.
9. Remember not to read the material to us from the screen. That doesn't mean you can't refer to the screen, but look at us too!

Remember also to elaborate on what you have written in your presentation (Don't just read the bulleted points to us--say something more). Stand up and look us in the eye when you speak; you don't need to bend over (pick up the mouse to click it!).

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An Example

For example, if your work sample topic is going to be an instructional unit about frogs and toads, then you might assemble a brief presentation about the differences between toads and frogs.

Note: This presentation is missing two things that are required for our assignment. What are they?

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PowerPoint tutorials

Click to view online a PowerPoint presentation that summarizes the features of the program as they were presented in class.

If you are interested in using a PowerPoint tutorial beyond what we did in class, check out the atomic learning website and use the username and password as supplied in class.

http://www.actden.com/pp/ is a site supported by Microsoft for educators. It has some excellent tutorials written for the Windows version of the software. 

Effective presentations

Many teachers use Powerpoint to create presentations for their students and for other educators. In this course I encourage you to also have your students author in PowerPoint, using presentation software as a tool to show their understanding of what they are learning.

Here are a couple of resources that talk in more detail about giving effective presentations.

-Woods and Smith's article "Six steps to a dynamite presentation from Learning and Leading with Technology" distributed in class or available for subscribers at the L&L website.
-Woods, D., & Smith, R. A. (1999). Six steps to a dynamite presentation, Learning & Leading with Technology, 26(5), 5pp. 8-59

-Top ten slide tips from Garr Reynolds, a marketing guru whose intended audience is business but whose tips have been helpful to practicing educators I have worked with (contributed by Ana Morehouse of the Northwest Regional Education Service District).

PowerPoint in the Classroom | Assignment | Tech specs/guidelines | Example | Tutorial

Last Updated 8/06
Copyright Dr. Mike Charles © all educational uses encouraged
Direct comments or questions to charlesm@pacificu.edu