Week 8: May I Present . . .

Sick of PowerPoint? Yes, there are other presentation tools out there. To see how many just take a look (right) at the array of Web 2.0 tools tagged with the word presentation. Some require a download, so you and students could use them on your personal devices, but not on school computers. Others live entirely online--nothing to download.

For this week's post I'll feature two options and one resource you might not we aware of.

Google Documents has a presentation tool. (I know I said no more Google last week, but I can't help it.) It works pretty much just like an older version of PowerPoint. Its main virtue is that it's collaborative; something that PowerPoint definitely is not. Several people can view and edit the same presentation (up to 10 people can edit at the same time). Imagine that! Instead of your students saving their PowerPoints to the public drive or passing around a jump dirve, their team project can live online--they can access it from home and school! Another benefit is that when they share it with you, you can see the revision history. Did someone say they did all the work? Well, why not just take a look. NOTE: To use Google Presentations, you need a Google Account. To have a Google Account, you must be over 13*. Another NOTE: If you want to learn more about using the collaborative nature of Google Docs, make sure you attend the Summer Conference--we'll definitely have some classes.

And now for something entirely different! Prezi! You've got to see this one to believe it. (Here's the link to the Prezi pictured to the left.) It's a zooming, non-linear presentation editor. Unfortunately, Prezi restricts its use to those over 18*, so it's off bounds for most of our students. Nonethless, I can imagine some of you using it in place of PowerPoint for some of your own presentations. When I first started playing with Prezi last year (or was it the year before?) I faced a steep learning curve because I was so used to the linear format of PowerPoint. Nonetheless, I loved the idea. So much more interesting than a traditional powerpoint--watch the 1-minute video at their site to get the idea.

Finally, do you know about Slideshare? Slideshare is a presentation hosting site. Folks from all over upload and share presentations they've made. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Yes, someone probably already has made a presentation about your topic. I like browsing to see what's  available for my own learning, for examples of good (lots of images/little text) and (unfortunately) bad (few images/lots of text) presentation examples, and for slideshows I might be able to use myself.

Bonus: One more thing (sorry): Do you know about Pecha Kucha? Pecha Kucha is a presentation format devised in Tokyo in 2003. Presenters get 20 slides and 20 seconds to talk for each slide. The slides are forwarded automatically while the presenter speaks. Pecha Kucha Nights are held all over the world now. Maybe there's a Pecha Kucha Day coming to a classroom near you? Let me know, I'd love to come.

This week's assignment (choose one of the following):

1. Investigate Google Presentation, Prezi, or one of the other web 2.0 presentation tools. What do you think? Report back here.
2. Check out Slideshare's collection of presentations. Here's the link to their education section. What did you find? What could you contribute?

*I mentioned age requirements twice in this post. Why? Because we need to make sure we're aware of the age requirements sites have AND that we're having students comply with them. It's not okay to tell students to lie about their age in order to use a site. You can find age requirements in a site's Terms of Use. (Yes, you should be reading the Terms of Use--especially if you're using the site with students.)