(thanks to New Yorker)
This year when teaching I faced demands from students for PowerPoint presentations. I said, "No."
I felt it pandered to them in the worst way. All they seemed interested in doing was copying what was on the screen.
So instead I showed them videos, enacted short dramas in class, put up interesting websites and generally provoked them to think.
I used a lot of humour. If you're going to talk about snails in ginger beer bottles, little old ladies colliding with splat walls (google it), and why leather factories are the worst places to work or live next to, you have to find a way of making it digestible.
PowerPoint isn't the answer, nor is it the answer to conference presentations, but that's another story.
I'm sure Edward Tufte likes the idea of the last PowerPoint too....
Comments