Dear PowerPointers,
I hope you are
constantly thinking of ways to improve the effectiveness of your PowerPoints, just as I am.
It’s a battle because it’s so time intensive, but the rewards to your students or
audience are worth it. They receive the benefits in their engagement,
attention, learning, and memory of your message.
CHOOSING A TEMPLATE
My latest PowerPoint
illustration is derived from one of my keynotes on the Net Generation. The
issue is using a basic template throughout your presentation. There are
thousands of FREE templates available, so none of this involves a nickel out of
your pocket.
The artistic configuration of your template can be a boon and bane
to your presentation. It provides an attractive image for text, bullet points, visuals,
graphics, and media, but it can also restrict the placement of that content in
the available space. Only you can weigh the pluses and minuses. You don’t want
the template to pull the focus of your audience away from the key content. It
should not distract.
WHAT'S THE POINT?
With that notion in
mind, once you have drafted the text, how can you add transitions, animations,
music, and videos to increase the impact of your message?
My RULE OF THUMB:
Keep asking yourself, “What’s the point of this slide? How does it contribute
to my message?”
Every element should have a purpose and contribute something UNIQUE to the effect of the slide. If you don’t know the
point of the slide, how’s your audience supposed to know? What should they
remember from what you say about each slide? Does the material on the slide
support your point?
ADDING MEDIA
This PowerPoint
(converted to video) contains only a few opening slides from a presentation. Consider
how the music, especially lyrics, animation, and video clip are used to make
several points about the Net Generation:
Click this link: "POWERPOINT GOES TO BROADWAY"
You can do this with your PowerPoint software and free templates. There are no tricks involved. This entire process can be done by YOU cost-free. Consider your templates without any animation or media; just dead words. Media can create the difference between an unforgettable and forgettable PowerPoint.
Let me know your reaction and thoughts.
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
Over the past 6 months, I completed a blog series, 3
articles, and 6 YouTube videos on PowerPoint®. It is a challenging
medium for presentations, but it is the industry standard in teaching,
speaking, and business. I don’t know of anyone who is satisfied with his/her PowerPoint®.
It can always be improved.
VIDEO SERIES on PowerPoint®
In the recent video series, I have attempted to create
examples of PowerPoint® formats, particularly with multimedia, that
anyone can do with their version of PowerPoint® for free. You don’t
need a degree in graphic or instructional design or technology to produce
effective PowerPoints®. The latest video is the most basic, demonstrating
how you can transform a simple dead word on a slide and add color, animation,
music, still image, and video to improve the learning from a slide. While there
are tons of tutorials, this is my 3-min. attempt: VIDEO
Let me know whether this is helpful.
HAPPY POWERPOINT!
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
MUSIC (continued)
Research Evidence: PHYSIOLOGICAL. Physiologically, there is mounting evidence that music can effectively elicit highly pleasurable emotional responses (Krumhansl, 1997; Rickard, 2004; Sloboda & Justin, 2001). Neuroimaging studies have confirmed those responses (Blood & Zatorre, 2001; Menon & Levitin, 2005; Koelsch , Fritz, Cramon, Muller, & Friederici, 2006). Most recently, however, music-induced emotional states have been linked to dopamine release, the chemical that sends “feel good” signals to the rest of the body (Salimpoor et al, 2011). The kicker here is that the PET and MRI scans recorded this release and the intense physiological responses based on students’ listening to their preferred music rather than just someone else’s tunes.
CONCLUSION: This evidence strongly indicates that catchy melody, fast, up-tempo, major-key music can activate sensory functions that can excite and snap your students to attention. It creates an emotional connection that can engage any audience like no other element in PowerPoint®. The music must not only be familiar, but should be within their choice pool.
Music embedded throughout a PowerPoint® presentation can sustain attention while slipping the content into long-term memory (Berk, 2001, 2002, 2008; Millbower, 2000). Even background “passive” music can increase attention levels, improve retention and memory, extend focused learning time, and expand thinking skills (Brewer, 1995).
Unfortunately, these music results were not tested specifically in the context of PowerPoint® in the classroom under controlled experimental conditions. In other words, the answer to the original title of this blog (see previous blog) is a tentative YES! Until we know for sure, the above conclusions are wishful projections.
WHAT’S NEXT? What’s left? The best is last. Probably the most powerful additions are visual images and videos. But what does the research say?
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
MUSIC
When you're listening to music or watching a TV program (Glee), movie, YouTube clip, or a commercial, your feelings and emotions, such as excitement, anger, laughter, relaxation, sadness, love, whimsy, or even boredom, are often triggered or heightened by the music playing behind the action. These emotions occur reflexively. You are responding to the mood created by the music and the scene. The music can have a strong effect on how you react (Levitin, 2006, 2008). A single song or the entire soundtrack is so powerful that you may download it off the Internet so you can listen again and again to relive the experience. Is there any evidence to support these effects? You bet!
Research Evidence: PSYCHOLOGICAL. The research indicates that music elicits emotional reactions of liking or disliking and excitement or arousal (North & Hargreaves, 1997; Robazza, Macaluso, & D’Urso, 1994; Sloboda & Justin, 2001). It can set the tone or mood instantaneously (Sousou, 1997; Stratton & Zalanowski, 1994). Music is also the emotional source of “chills” or “your hair standing on end” (Panksepp, 1995; Salimpoor, Benovoy, Larcher, Dagher, & Zatorre, 2011).
Research Evidence: HEMISPHERIC. The best news is that music taps both hemispheres of your brain: the left side processes rhythm and lyrics AND the right side listens for melodies, sounds, and harmonic relationships (Bever & Chiarello, 1974; Hébert & Peretz, 1997; Schlaug, Jancke, Haung, Staiger, & Steinmetz, 1995), and the connections between the two hemispheres increase as you age (Schlaug et al., 1995). In fact, music listening engages nearly every area of the brain and involves almost every neural subsystem (Levitin, 2006).
WHAT’S NEXT? I’ll finish this topic with the physiological evidence and my conclusions on using music in PowerPoint.
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
ST. PATRICK'S DAY BLOG!
My next few blogs will focus on the research on three neglected elements in PowerPoint®: (1) movement, (2) music, and (3) videos. The simple question is: Do they improve learning or anything else? Do they have the potential to raise the PowerPoint® bar to a new level of “best practices” in the classroom? Let’s begin with
MOVEMENT (Dedicated to Fans of PREZI)
When something moves, your eyeballs move to track it. That’s perfectly natural. However, when the movement slows up or stops in your classroom, students may get bored and click to something else. PowerPoint® permits transitions of slides and animation of words, letters, and graphics. When that movement is systematically choreographed throughout a presentation, it can grab and maintain attention. Used inappropriately, it can annoy and distract your students from the content being covered.
Research Evidence: TEXT. Is there research on the use of transitions and animation in the classroom? Not on transitions, but a smidgen on text animation. The technique of introducing bits and pieces of text information incrementally on slides with animation has been tested by only a couple of studies (Janicki, Yaylacicegi, & Mahar, 2009; Mahar, Yaylacicegi, & Janicki, 2009). Despite students’ preference for animation in PowerPoint® lectures, the results indicated that students shown static lecture slides learned more about new concepts than those who viewed the animated slides. The animation required greater concentration with a shorter exposure time. Certainly, that time could be extended.
Research Evidence: GRAPHICS. Contrary to the preceding results is the research that found that animated graphics are significantly more effective than static graphics (Höffler & Leutner, 2007; Lowe, 2001, 2003; Mayer & Moreno, 2002; McLean, Brown, & Bellamy, 2003; Tversky, Morrison, & Betrancourt, 2002; Yu & Smith, 2008). Properly designed animations to illustrate concepts and procedures can generate interest, motivation, and engagement, which can promote deep learning (Mayer & Anderson, 1991; Ruffini, 2009). There are no studies testing different types of animation. Presenting techniques or processes, in particular, may benefit more from animation.
CONCLUSION: Consider using animation when it fits the content, especially to explain processes in graphic form. Transitions and animation of text should be used judiciously, since there is inadequate evidence to the contrary.
WHAT’S NEXT? Have you used music in your slides to create an emotional connection or humor? There’s lots of research on this topic. Just wait…
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
MULTIMEDIA IS DISCOURAGED BY EXPERTS
Beyond the basics of PowerPoint®, how can multimedia be utilized effectively with PowerPoint® in the classroom? Other than posting “dead words” on a screen, do movement, music, and videos in PowerPoint® facilitate learning or impede it? To date, those elements have been virtually disregarded, dismissed, dissed, and even discouraged by PowerPoint® gurus (in business and industry) when the technology to embed or stream those media is readily available? For example, Duarte (2008) and Reynolds (2008) give them miniscule attention, yet acknowledge the powerful active cognitive processing effects they can have. They usually caution users to integrate them either sparingly or not at all or to “not overdo it.” But most teachers and presenters under do it or don’t do it at all. To engage Net Generation students, in particular, who are bored with traditional PowerPoints®, faculty may need “to do” and, maybe, “over do.”
WHERE’S THE LOVE AND SUPPORT?
With FREE software readily accessible, such as Audacity (music) and Movie Maker (videos), why do so few faculty and presenters incorporate media into their presentations? Even a study of presentations by CEOs of technology companies indicated that multimedia was incorporated typically in the form of photographs and graphics, but no music and very few animations, videos, and online links were used (Kammeyer, 2007).
Granted, in-house IT staff may not have the time or want to be bothered to assist faculty to do the animations or actual media extractions and conversions. They may have other more pressing demands. By default, then, teachers are forced either to learn it themselves or to outsource it to techies who know how to do it; otherwise, it won’t get done. With time becoming a scarcer commodity and job tasks and responsibilities increasing, multimedia in PowerPoint® may be a luxury many professionals cannot afford.
WHY RESEARCH ON MULTIMEDIA?
Do any of those PowerPoint® add-ons, such as movement, music, visuals, and videos, contribute to the effectiveness of instruction? Do they increase attention, engagement, or understanding of the content? Should faculty move literally and figuratively beyond dead words on the screen? They may already have slides with bright, high-contrast, saturated colors, flashy templates, and loads of graphics. That’s great, but what are the words doing? If they’re still cadaver-like, teachers will immediately shift their Net Geners from boring to snoring. Say it with me: “DEAD WORDS ARE BORING!” Got it? Did you actually say those words?
WHAT’S NEXT? The next few blogs will review the research on movement, music, visuals, and videos in PowerPoint®.
COPYRIGHT © 2011 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
