Logan Freeman

Professor Ruth Benander

English 2089

17 November 2022

Demonstrating The Importance And Potential of Slideshow Presentations

To Students in High School

Introduction

When beginning this course, I wanted my goal to use my passion for the field of technology to help make meaningful change. With the many innovations in technology, there are a multitude of opportunities that can lead to a much more effective and efficient life. I have come across so many instances where technology has been able to make a notable difference in my life and in others. Though, this overall idea was too broad and held so many potential specific opportunities for change. I began combing through my interests and with the advice I gathered, I narrowed down my goal to slideshow presentations. The idea of a slideshow presentation is a format of presentation that involves innovations in technology. I have always found the format of slideshow presentations to hold a lot of potential in portraying thoughts and ideas effectively. With slideshows, you can pace your information, create functional visuals, perfect the presentation aspect, along with so much more that can aid in engaging your audience. When done properly and used in the right scenario, slideshows can produce a much higher level of understanding and learning.

In the early stages of developing my project, I was already aware of a possible community I could work with to pilot my eventual idea for change. While in high school, my IT teacher acted as a sort of mentor for guiding me through that point of my education and life. I discussed the fact that I was in this course and needed an opportunity to make a difference. She said she was happy to help me achieve my goal and would provide me the opportunity in her classes if I needed it. When I went back to my high school earlier this semester to have this conversation, I sat in an IT class where students were working on slideshows for an assignment. I noticed that students were not putting their full effort into making this assignment's creation, as almost every student was using a template for the basis of their slide show. This was around the time when I was beginning the development of my project, and needed ideas for what to do.

Seeing this possibility for change, I began to shift and narrow my focus to that of proper slideshow presentation creation. Throughout high school, I developed the passion of creating slideshow presentations on my own due to a spark of interest. I noticed that the proper process of creating these presentations was under taught. Therefore, I had to learn the majority of these skills on my own through trial and error without a proper guide. Due to my passion, in combination with what I saw on my visit, and what I experienced in the past, I believed this was a perfect opportunity for change. Since I believed the idea of slideshow presentations was lacking coverage in my high school, I wanted to give that knowledge to students. With my passion, I made it my goal to teach students about this format of portraying and relaying information. I developed the idea of creating and presenting a slideshow presentation about the importance and possibilities of slideshow presentations. I believe with all that went into the process of creating and developing my project, it fit my goal and ideals perfectly. I knew I wanted to incorporate a passion of mine in a project that was actually meaningful to me. Though, I wanted to do all of this in a way that pushed my comfort zone but still in a familiar scenario where I could really do my best to make a meaningful difference.

Literature Review

The topic I will be researching is the idea of helping a community of high school students in IT classes grow the important skill of creating proper slideshow or Powerpoint presentations. This concept is of great importance due to the effectiveness slideshow presentations can have when presenting information and portraying thoughts. Therefore, the earlier this skill can be taught the more students can develop it over time. From my interview and prior experience, I am aware of many pitfalls students may have when they are creating these presentations. Although, there is certainly a lot I can learn and improve on myself by performing some research. My goal in this literacy review is to find specific sources in order to develop a better understanding of my topic. This process will effectively lead to a better overall project when it comes to that time.When searching for sources, I input specific search terms into the search engine known as Google Scholar. I also confirmed that these sources met the standard I needed for this Literacy Review.

Beginning with my first research point, I discovered an interesting article. The article I found, “Using Cognitive Load Theory to improve the use of slideshow presentations and support a more efficient learning process”, published in University of Hertfordshire, by Shibli demonstrates the important process of creating more effective slideshow presentations. While combing through research articles, this piece stood out to me as potentially very useful in my ambition for this course. Shibli starts off the abstract by stating, “Improving slideshow presentations can have positive effects on the learning process. Simple adjustments to the design of slides can focus the learner’s attention and reduce the demand on the learner to process the information,” (Shibli). As I have noticed in my own experience with this format of presentations, putting focus on how your slideshow is developed is important. With proper rules and design decisions, which this article goes into, one may produce a much more successful degree of learning. This article specifically focuses on an interesting aspect, as “information can be lost due to distraction or being presented in a way that is not sympathetic to how the mind works, ” (Shibli). The overall idea of this research article was to connect how we think humans learn to the presentation format of slideshows.

Selecting from the most interesting pieces of information, in “Figure 1: A simple model of the mind”, a chart is used to describe how we believe memory in the mind operates. Ultimately, information in the working or long-term memory can be forgotten. Therefore when making slideshows, we can harness this idea and work to prevent the process of forgetting. This connects to the idea of Cognitive Load Theory where Shibli then defines three particular examples of how cognitive load can take effect. These examples of Cognitive Load Theory are known as Intrinsic, Extraneous, and Germane. The idea taken from this example is that “to encourage the storage of information in the long-term memory a teacher/lecturer must consider how they can manage the intrinsic load and reduce the extraneous load,” (Shibli). As well as this, in figure 2 they define the equation “cognitive overload = task demand / available resources”. This is certainly an interesting way to look at this idea of cognitive overload. As the more a work task requires demand and processing, the more you are limited by your available resources. Then, Shibli gave some examples of producing a good slideshow. The first is that “Too much writing is another example of excessive extraneous cognitive load in a slide,” (Shibli). As well as this, “Many slideshows are littered with these irrelevant images which are used with the good intention of engaging the learner. But it is important to select images that are appropriate to the group being taught and remove irrelevant information,” (Shibli). Personally, I have seen this all of the time, as many students end up using irrelevant images since they are told to use images in general. Too, often they do not realize how much more effective a presentation may be with relevant images where needed. The article then goes into more interesting theories that are involved in producing better slideshows. Finally, Shibli concludes with these recommendations, “1. Keep the amount of text on a slide to a minimum. 2. Think carefully about the images used and ask yourself if they support the development of a concept. 3. Ensure that every detail on the slide can be read by the audience. 4. Use animations to reveal text or images one at a time to focus attention,” (Shibli). Overall, this article provides a multitude of interesting data and concepts that should be used in order to create more engaging and effective slideshows.

While searching through sources I could use to improve my goal, I came across one which I felt could give interesting data regarding the program I plan to use. The article, “Learning using the google slides mobile application and its impact on attitude, motivation and achievement for industrial design subjects in the tve”, published by University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, by Ahmad et al. describe the effectiveness of Google Slide as a teaching application. Their work particularly pertains to the software Google Slides, which is what I plan to explore while teaching my community of students. Although this article focuses on how Google Slides is used in non face-to-face teaching situations, I believe the information is relevant in displaying the effectiveness of Google Slides. In this research, “A total of 39 students were selected as the study sample… Data were analyzed using descriptive analysis, i.e. mean and standard deviation to see the influence of learning using google slides mobile application on the level of attitude, motivation, and student achievement,” (Ahmad et al.). When considering my goal for change in this course, I feel as though this may be valuable information to know. As Ahmad et al. state, “The teaching and learning process can be improved in quality and diversified delivery and acceptance through several techniques such as computer and software assistance,” (Ahmad et al.). With today’s amount of development in technology, there is a multitude of software that may aid in the process of teaching.

This was a starting point in my goal for this course, to define the usefulness of slideshow presentations as a format, particularly in teaching others. Alternatively, this format is successful in better portraying one's thoughts and ideas. Ahmad et al. claim that “The results of the study found that the level of students' attitude towards the use of Google Slides for Industrial Design subjects as a whole was at a high level,” (Ahmad et al.). An example of the study was table four which was meant to represent the “Levels of Student Attitudes in the Use of Google Slides”. These results for table four show that the course of Industrial Design, which operates using Google Slides, is effective in promoting critical and engaging learning. Following this, there are similar examples that cover the motivation and achievement of students using Google Slides. Both then conclude that the application of Google slides produces a response level that is high. Overall, the article concludes with, “Therefore, readiness for the use of Google Slides mobile application is very important for lecturers and students to be able to master… Attitudes, motivations and student achievement in the use of Google Slides are at a high level,” (Ahmad et al.). There is a lot to take from this journal, though it provides data that suggests the effectiveness of Google Slides as an application in terms of presenting and relaying information.

Next, when researching for articles pertaining to my goal for this course, I came across an article that immediately caught my attention. This article, “PowerPoint Is Evil”, published by Wired, by Tufte acts as a historical reference for the adoption of slideshow presentations and offers advice on their use. Beginning with the article in question, Tufte identifies the origin of slideshow presentations. As stated in the article, “the format has become ubiquitous under PowerPoint, which was created in 1984 and later acquired by Microsoft,” (Tufte). Followed by this definition, the idea of the Powerpoint format is put under a very critical view. Stating that PowerPoint “may help speakers outline their talks, but convenience for the speaker can be punishing to both content and audience,” (Tufte). This can certainly be true, as this highlights the fact that some situations simply are not ideal for the format of a slideshow. A quote that shows this is, “When information is stacked in time, it is difficult to understand context and evaluate relationships. Visual reasoning usually works more effectively when relevant information is shown side by side,” (Tufte). When making a slideshow you are limited to one slide at a time, with the proper word count, you can’t necessarily implement much information on each individual slide.This may be a situation where information is not best presented like this, and other methods of presenting could be used instead.

Slideshows aren’t a solution for all presentations, but often data can be adapted to work in its format. The article then provides some examples of faulty slide design, of course with the capabilities in 2003. This demonstrates the fact that clustered and incoherent slides are not effective ways to create slides. This leads to the absolute best takeaway from this retrospective, “But rather than supplementing a presentation, it has become a substitute for it. Such misuse ignores the most important rule of speaking: Respect your audience,” (Tufte). This quote makes the necessity of using a slideshow as a tool and not as the entire presentation piece clear. It also defines the other major rule, to keep your audience in mind at all times when giving a slideshow presentation. Otherwise, you are not reaching your full potential and probably only focusing on getting a good grade.

At the end of the previous article, there was a reference to the previous story titled, “Learning to Love PowerPoint”, published by Wired, by the Wired Staff, which offers a second historical viewpoint. One particular piece of opinion the author gives is that, “Having never used the program before, I found it limiting, inflexible, and biased, like most software. On top of that, PowerPoint makes hilariously bad-looking visuals. But that's a small price to pay for ease and utility,” (Wired Staff). This is simply a bit of a historical report of how slideshows used to look and operate. As well as, “Although I began by making fun of the medium, I soon realized I could actually create things that were beautiful. I could bend the program to my own whim and use it as an artistic agent,” (Wired Staff). This idea represents one of my favorite parts of the formats of slideshows as a whole, the visual part. With slideshows, the visual aspect can be harnessed as a tool to engage the audience's retention of information to a whole other level. Apparently even back in 2003. This kind of data’s real application is a time capsule, to compare how much this format has improved more than 18 years later. Even then, most of the information still holds up and can be applied to modern-day situations.

Next, I pursued an article that defined some rules on proper presentation skills. The article, “Learning oral presentation skills”, published in Journal of General Internal Medicine by Haber and Lingard, which focused on how students and professors communicate with oral presentations. This caught my attention as proper presentation skills are one half the information I plan to teach. Harber et al. wrote this article in 2001, although I believe it still presents interesting data and conclusions. When using slideshows to give presentations, it is best to present information regarding the topic while using slides as a tool. This dense research piece included “Twelve third-year medical students during their internal medicine clerkship and 14 teachers… One-hundred sixty hours of ethnographic observation, including 73 oral presentations on rounds. Discourse-based interviews of 8 students and 10 teachers,” (Haber et al.). Although this article focuses on students and professors who are physicians,, the overall data in this research is still valid to the goal I wish to achieve in this course. When considering the idea of how presentation skills are developed, this article claims it has a lot to do with the idea of rhetoric. They state that this concept is “social science which studies communication in terms of context and explores the action of language on knowledge, attitudes, and values,” (Haber et al.5). When applying rhetoric to a situation involving oral presentations, you must remain aware of the content’s context in your delivery. Considering the main results of this study, it concludes with the main idea that “students and teachers had different perceptions of the purpose of oral presentations,” (Haber et al.). They determined that teachers tended to be more contextual with the information they presented, while students were more contextual. This can apply to my project because the idea represents a solution in order to better present information and thoughts.

According to this research, presenting it may be best to develop and consider the context of the information you are giving. One main quote I took away from this article was, “Students learn oral presentation by trial and error rather than through teaching of an explicit rhetorical model. This may delay development of effective communication skills and result in acquisition of unintended professional values. Teaching and learning of oral presentation skills may be improved by emphasizing that context determines content and by making explicit the tacit rules of presentation,” (Haber et al.). From past experiences, this is often what I have picked up. As I’ve noticed no student was ever taught the proper way to create slideshows and importantly how to effectively present them. They operate through trial and error, whereas teaching proper techniques may lead to a better understanding overall. This concept is why I believe my goal for this course holds value in terms of creating change in a community. I believe the information put forth in this source can certainly aid me in developing a better way of giving and teaching oral communication.

Finally, when looking for sources, I needed something that connected the overall format of slideshows and their use in education. The article, “Patterns of PowerPoint Use in Higher Education: a Comparison between the Natural, Medical, and Social Sciences”, published in Innovative Higher Education, by Herting et al. presents a multitude of dense information discussing the place of slideshows in education. This study “was completed by 106 faculty members from different disciplines. The results suggest the existence of different patterns in the use of PowerPoint,” (Herting et al.). Although this article focuses on how slideshows are used in specific kinds of studies, I believe the information gathered is useful to my goal in this course. Within figure 1 of this article, Herting et al. present a chart that lists the percentage compared to different activities involved in learning, studying, reflection, memory, and examples. With each activity, there are four various methods/senses used in learning, Textual, Visual, Auxiliary, and Mixed. These four are then weighted on their effectiveness in each learning activity. In particular, the study gives better context to the uses of PowerPoint and how various learning activities are affected by its use. Although this demonstrates that the format of slideshows is not the best in every scenario, other methods may be better. This is something important that must be considered when wanting to use a specific format in terms of sharing or teaching information. An important quote from the conclusion is, “While we know that the text-image combination seems to be better for critical learning, it is not very clear if this combination works equally well in all contexts,” (Herting et al.). This solidifies the idea that slideshow presentations are not the ultimate formation in all situations, though it has a strong place in some. This article holds a wealth of information, some of which applies to my goal by displaying the importance of knowing and demonstrating slideshows as a format.

In conclusion, the research I was able to conduct has certainly allowed me to understand the material for my goal to a better degree. These six sources I acquired represented and gave different informative information regarding my ambition for this course. The first source provided a multitude of information about improving slideshows using knowledge of the mind that can certainly be used in the future to achieve my goal. The second helps validate the effectiveness of my plan to use Google Slides, which is already strongly established, to teach my community how to create proper slideshows. Sources three & four gave a perspective from the past, as well as relevant information regarding slideshows to produce a better project. Source five can help me with many potential solutions for better oral communication and its development, which is the main half of slideshow presentations. The sixth source suggested the importance of knowing the pros and cons of slideshow presentations as a format.

Importantly, the first source “Using Cognitive Load Theory to Improve the Use of Slideshow Presentations and Support a More Efficient Learning Process”, source three “PowerPoint Is Evil”, and source four “Learning to Love Powerpoint” are all connected in a certain way. All of these sources display the grave importance of considering proper slide design and give their own takes on how to implement this better design. These three particular sources and the fifth source “Learning oral presentation skills” are connected as well. These sources represent the two major functions of slideshow presentations, which are the slideshow mechanism itself and the aspect of presenting those slideshows. Then, source two “Learning using the google slides mobile Application and its impact on attitude, Motivation and achievement for industrial Design subjects in the tve” and source six “Patterns of PowerPoint Use in Higher Education: a Comparison between the Natural, Medical, and Social Sciences” hold a particular connection. These two sources represent particular ways slideshow presentations are used and implemented in different scenarios. Overall, I am satisfied with the number of sources I found and the information presented within them. Upon further review and integration, I will certainly be able to use these sources to improve my goal for this course.

Methods

Introduction to The Survey

To gain a better perspective of my community, I conducted a survey which included various questions. This survey was given to all three IT classes at my previous highschool, which was the community I wished to make a difference in.

For the first question, I asked “How much do you enjoy learning?” on a 1 to 5 scale from not at all to a lot. The reason I posed this question was to better determine these students' attitudes when it came to the general idea of learning.

The second question was “Are you making an effort to increase your knowledge?”, with responses “Yes, I am doing my best”, “I plan to try harder”, and “No, I do not see much reason”. I asked this question to determine how much effort students believed they were putting into the betterment of their knowledge. This was again a general question that professed the overarching goal of my idea for change which was to promote learning of a certain topic.

For the third question, I asked “In general, how confident are you in your skills with using and benefiting from technology?”, with responses “Very Confident”, “Confident”, “Somewhat Confident”, and “Not Confident”. Since these students were a part of IT classes, I asked this question to really determine how students thought about their abilities in technology.

Then, the fourth question of this survey was “Are you considering a career in IT?”, which included responses “Yes”, “Maybe”, and “No”. This question came after the first, which addressed confidence with technology, whereas this question addressed students' potential consideration for their future with technology.

For the fifth question I asked “Do you see value in the format of slideshows?”, with simple responses “Yes” and “No”. This question was meant to introduce my topic which I planned to pursue change with. I wanted to better understand my community’s attitude towards slideshows by asking this question.

For my sixth question I posed “How confident are you in making slideshow presentations?”, which had responses “Very confident”, “Confident”, “Somewhat Confident”, and “Not Confident”. This question also addressed my topic for my project and gave an opportunity to survey students' ability in making slideshow presentations, which was a major factor.

Then, for my seventh question I asked “How often have you made a slideshow while in school?” which had the potential responses “Often”, “Sometimes”, “Rarely”, and “Never”. This question was meant to verify the use of slideshows at my previous high school, as compared to what I experienced throughout my path.

The eighth question was “When watching a students slideshow presentation, have you noticed any of these common issues?”, where the checkbox responses were “No pictures”, “Not engaging”, “Uses a template”, “Too much information”, and “I have not paid attention”. I posed this question in order to see students’ perspectives of problems they may have noticed in the past when it comes to slideshow presentations they have observed.

Finally, the ninth and last question I posed asked “Would you be interested in learning about creating better slideshow presentations?”, where responses were “Yes”, “Maybe”, and “No”. This question served as a way to gauge how effective my project may be, and to get a better feeling of students' interests.

To distribute this survey, I had Mrs. P, the teacher of these classes, give it to the students to fill out. In the end, 38 students from three IT classes answered this survey with varying responses, which would help determine my project down the line. During the creation of this survey, I had just discovered what I potentially wanted to do with my project. Therefore, I changed the course of my survey and asked more narrow questions towards the end. I began with more general questions as a guide into these more focused questions. Looking back, I definitely feel as though I asked a few too many questions which could have been condensed to improve the experience of taking this survey. With this hindsight, this factor is something I improved on with the final survey that students took after I presented my project.

Introduction to The Interview

To develop my project further, I conducted an interview with someone who has knowledge with this format of presenting. The person I interviewed is the IT teacher at my previous highschool, Mrs. Pamulapati, or Mrs. P. She is also the teacher of the classes I helped by using my skills in making slideshow presentations. Going through these classes myself, she stood out as one of the teachers that most valued these kinds of presentations. Therefore, I figured this interview would give me a better perspective when it comes to my goal for this course. I configured four questions to gather more information and insight that helped me guide my project for this course. My interview with the IT teacher of the classes in my community, Mrs. Pamulapati, was conducted over email. This format of interview is what worked the best, as it gave time for Mrs. P to construct her responses and allowed me to keep track of those responses.

Beginning with my first interview question I asked, “Do you believe it is an important skill to be able to create proper slide shows? Especially in terms of building this skill through practice in class? If so, why?”. The reason I began the interview with this question was due to its importance to my project. My idea to help teach the process of making better slideshow presentations needs to be meaningful to make a lasting difference. Therefore, I wanted to ask Mrs. Pamulapati if she sees the importance of this idea in general.

In my next question I asked, “How do you decide whether to ask students to create a slideshow rather than other methods such as writing? Do some specific topics need this type of expression? If so, why? (pros/cons?)”. The reason I asked this question was because I wanted to get an idea of why Mrs. Pamulapati assigns slideshows in her classes. Slideshows are a specific kind format, so I felt this question may give more insight about their use.

For my third question I asked. “If anything, what do you think the majority of your students can improve when it comes to making and presenting slideshows? Also, what do you believe determines a good/proper slideshow in terms of school or even the work world? What do you look for?”. This question is probably the overall most important for my project, as I needed ideas of improvement in order to create a meaningful amount of change. I hoped to gain insight into how students in my community can improve when it comes to building slideshows and presenting them. Importantly, this information is from the perspective of someone who has to study and grade a big amount of these kinds of presentations every school year.

The final question I asked was, “How do you use slideshows in your profession? Have you had to use them in other jobs besides teaching? If so, was this format able to get your thoughts and ideas across? Why?”. I felt as though this question could be meaningful to see Mrs. P’s own experience with slideshow presentations.

Results

Results For The Survey

For the results of question one, “How much do you enjoy learning?” for responses 1-5; 5.3% for 1, 18.4% for 2, 34.2% for 3, 34.2% for 4, and 7.9% for 5. These results are interesting as they showed that the majority of students who took the survey enjoy learning. This is important data, as the goal of my project strongly involved teaching students about slideshow presentations. As well as this, it provided a better understanding of the attitude most students may portray. See Figure 1.

Then, the results for question two, “Are you making an effort to increase your knowledge?”; 55.3% for “Yes, I am doing my best”, 44.7% for “I plan to try harder”, and no respondes for “No, I do not see much reason”. These results work in tandem with the previous question, as they also showed students’ attitude toward improving their knowledge. Therefore, this aids in solidifying my overarching goal for this project, which is to teach students and improve their knowledge. See Figure 2.

For question three “In general, how confident are you in your skills with using and benefiting from technology?”. The responses were 45.9% for “Somewhat Confident”, 40.5% for “Confident”, 10.8% for “Very Confident”, and 2.7% for “Not Confident”. The results of this question showed that there was some potential improvement in terms of students’ confidence with technology. As technology is often full of complexity, therefore I needed to be able to present information in a way that is understandable and engaging. See Figure 3.

Next for the results of question four, “Are you considering a career in IT?”; 47.4% for “Maybe”, 26.3% for “Yes”, and 26.3% for “No”. These results help gauge that the students in this class are unsure of their future with technology. In a way, my project could be used to help give them a better glimpse of possibilities in technology. Where hopefully students become inspired and take the possibilities even further. See Figure 4.

For the results of question five, “Do you see value in the format of slideshows?”; 81.6% for “Yes” and 18.4% for “No”. As the results of this question show, the majority of students seem to be aware that there is importance in the format of slideshows. This is an important building block that could help students retain and apply the information my project presented. As students could build on what they already know with possibilities they have yet to recognize or see. See Figure

Then for question six “How confident are you in making slideshow presentations?”. The results were; 52.6 for “Confident”, 21.1% for “Somewhat confident”, 18.4% for “Not confident”, and 7.9% for “Very confident”. The results of this question showed that the majority of students were relatively confident when it comes to making slideshows. Although, there was certainly the potential that students have not delved further into the possibilities. This factor is something I wished to improve on, to show students these possibilities so that they are aware of them in the future. See Figure 6.

For the results of question seven, “How often have you made a slideshow while in school?”; 48.6% for “Sometimes”, 40.5% for “Often”, 10.8% for “Rarely”, and no responses for “Never”. The results of this question verify what I expected, as going through school myself, various classes of all subjects included at least one assignment or project that incorporated slideshow presentations. See Figure 7.

Next, for question eight, “When watching a students slideshow presentation, have you noticed any of these common issues?”. The results were; 71.1% for “Not engaging”, 60.5% for “No pictures”, 31.6% for “Too much information”, 26.3% for “I have not paid attention”, and 21.1% for “Uses a template”. The results of this question were telling in terms of some faults students have noticed in others projects. As the top two results, of “Not engaging” and “No pictures”, are particular instances I have certainly noticed as well. Therefore, these points were something that I mentioned and focused on in my project. See Figure 8.

Finally, for the results of question nine, “Would you be interested in learning about creating better slideshow presentations?”; 50% for “Maybe”, 28.9% for “Yes”, and 21.1% for “No”. From the way I posed the question and with the topic, I figured students may not see much reason to be too excited. With these results of most students being on the edge of interest, I knew I needed to give it my all, and really inspire these students in order to make a meaningful difference. See Figure 9.

Overall, I believe this survey of my community was certainly able to give me a better understanding and perspective of the kind of change I wanted to pursue. As well as this, it also helped verify and better define my idea for my project.

Results For The Interview

For question one, her response was along the lines that having the skills of creating “informative and engaging” slideshows is critical to any student's success. Following this I asked if it is important to build these skills in the environment of a class. She said that students (in her experience) have been using slideshows for “quite some time”, although she notes that these students have never been taught “simple techniques to enhance their presentation or pitfalls to avoid”. She then gave a particular example that “most students just put all the words they want to say on a slide and then read them verbatim”, this ties into one of my later questions. I feel as though beginning with this question was good as it helped define the importance of my goal.

Next, for question two, in her response Mrs. P claims she likes to assign her students slideshows as she believes that it can be less overwhelming compared to a writing based assignment. Additionally, this format can allow for a much greater degree of personal expression and creativity. One particular quote she gave was, “the more you allow a student to pick and choose part of what they are doing, the more engaged they will be with the work and more ownership they will take”. This quote stood out as meaningful to me, as I’ve certainly noticed this idea taking shape in my own learning experience. Whenever I get to pick and choose what I’m doing with my work, I feel as though I get more out of it. Next, she said that new topics often require the information to be presented in multiple ways in order for the student to commit it into their working memory. To complete this task she recommended “chunking the material into smaller bits and adding graphical elements” as a way of better retaining information. This idea certainly applies to the format of slideshows, which can be used to show information in these kinds of methods. When creating a slideshow it is best to summarize information into bits or bullet points which can launch into talking points. As well as this, you can implement graphical elements in order to create a strong visual relation to the information. Mrs. Pamulapati’s response certainly presented a better perspective as to why she assigns slideshow presentations in her class.

Then, for question three, Mrs. Pamulapati’s response began with the fact that students can vastly improve the slide’s layout and the content presented on each slide. Most notably, she claims that too often students just read the bullet points on their slides rather than using them to launch into actual talking points. Therefore, she says that they learn to use slides as more of a tool, not just the sole element of their presentations. Then, she said she “I look for good typography, a variety of layouts and graphical elements”. Along with this she states that she would like to see students create their own layouts and themes, rather than using pre-installed templates. She notes that these options are a good place to start, but that higher education and the workforce often require more deeply tuned presentations. Programs like Google Slides and Microsoft Powerpoint allow a great degree of creativity, and this should certainly be harnessed in order to create this better product. Mrs. Pamulapati’s response definitely gives good inspiration for what I can do to promote improvement in my community.

Finally, for question four, she said that she uses “slides all the time in my profession as a teacher of K-12 students, college students and in professional development (when I am teaching adults)”. Then, she defined the reasons why the format of why slides can be a powerful method of presenting your thoughts. She said that the most useful slides are not overwhelming, but yet visually pleasing, and contain information which can be referred back to. This idea is important, as I’ve noticed there are many ways to create sideshows, but it’s critical to be able to create effective ones that can best portray your thoughts and ideas. Altogether, Mrs. Pamulapati’s response gave me a better idea of how she uses the format of slideshow presentations in her profession.

Overall, I feel as though this interview has certainly given a better perspective learning from a professional who uses slideshows. Mrs. Pamulapati’s responses were very valuable in developing a better project that seemingly created a meaningful difference in my community. Her answers to the first question I posed helped define why my goal for this course holds the potential to make a positive difference. Next, her responses to my second question gave me a better understanding of why and how slideshow presentations are used in the environment of my community. Then, for my third and most important question, Mrs. P’s response gave me possible pitfalls the students in my community can improve on in the process of making slideshows. Finally, the responses to my fourth question helped give perspective on Mrs. Pamulapati’s background with the format of slideshows in her profession. I am satisfied with the results of this interview as I was able to use it as a building block to produce a successful project for this course.

The Project

I piloted my project to three IT classes of 10-20 students at my previous high school with the opportunity the IT Teacher, Mrs. Pamulapati, provided. To show them the importance and the possibilities of slideshow presentations, my project was divided into two main parts, a slideshow presentation with proper rules and examples and an assignment with a demonstration. In other words, the more general theoretical part and the more hands-on practical part. The slideshow presentation portion of my project was also divided into two distinct parts, the slideshow and the presentation, both of which work together in tandem. When developing the slideshow aspect, the overall concept I focused on was making it a proper slideshow as to be an example for students. Therefore, all throughout the slideshow, I used many techniques of digital design and features offered by the program Google Slides, which the students are accustomed to. For the presentation aspect, I knew I needed to focus on its delivery to not only to spark interest but also to set a good example. For reference, the slideshow presentation I designed and developed can be found in my portfolio under “Project Update #2” (https://sites.google.com/view/freemanengl2089/project/project-update-2).

Going more in-depth into the slideshow portion, I began by introducing myself and why I was there to present in the first place. I wanted to give students perspective to my cause and why I am confident to talk about this topic. Then, I defined the idea of what a slideshow presentation is, where I split it into two main learning opportunities, The Slideshow or Visual and The Presentation or Verbal. I also emphasized that the information I give is very important to their future. First, in The Slideshow (Visual) category, I used the slides titled Representing Information and Digital Design. In Representing Information, I provided four important rules which I used as talking points to explain why each rule is important. In Digital Design, I gave three critical rules for designing digitally in the scenario of a slideshow. Next, in the category of The Presentation (Verbal), I gave one slide titled Giving a Presentation. In Giving a Presentation, I gave three main rules and techniques that were important when specifically giving a slideshow presentation. Following these two main categories, I tied it all together by showing students what the most important part of a slideshow presentation is the audience. In this slide, I strongly emphasized how all of the rules I mentioned need to be adapted and applied with the goal of engaging your audience. After giving students the information and rules they needed to know, I defined why slideshow presentations are incredibly valuable in certain scenarios. In this slide I used a few interactive techniques that aided in giving perspective to the uses of slideshows. For example, I set up the slideshow to turn off so I could show the students how different my presentation is without the visual aspect. See Figure 10.

Then, I transitioned into the assignment and demonstration, where I first enthusiastically presented a slide giving the guidelines for their assignment. They needed to create and design a title slide and information slide based on their favorite topic, company, sport, or etc. The most important detail was that they could not use a pre-made template. Instead, they needed to practice using their creativity to design their own theme. Practicing the design aspect is critical since this knowledge may be valuable in the future for creating custom tailored slideshows for specific topics. I used the assignment to allow students to apply the rules and concepts I presented into an actual working product. The idea behind this was to help students better commit the information to memory. As well as to give them a working opportunity to see the potential of slideshows and Google Slides. The more they practice, the more they learn these possibilities and can use them in the future. Although, this assignment could only focus on the visual aspect, as there would have been time constraints to also focus on the verbal aspect. Then , to build on the rules and give ideas for the assignment, I planned to give a demonstration which would show students actual techniques for creating slideshows. This was meant to work hand-and-hand with the assignment as it provided students concepts most were not aware of.

This concluded the first part of my project, and I came back two days later to help students with their assignments. I felt that this was important as I figured some students would have questions about how to do something. When they were finished, students submitted their work through a Google Form in order to give me permission to use their work for a measurement of change. In this form, I also gave the students a small survey to help determine how they felt after my presentation. My overall goal for this project was to show students the importance of slideshow presentations and give them a glimpse of the possibilities. I wanted to inspire them to practice these concepts so that they have the knowledge in the future. With this knowledge, they will be able to add a creative degree to their work in ways that they have never considered before.

Discussion

I believe the project I developed was able to achieve my goal of teaching students of my previous high school about the possibilities and importance of slideshow presentations. On Tuesday of week 9 of October 17 - 21, I presented my slideshow presentation to all three IT classes of 10-20 students at my previous high school. Following this, on Thursday of week 9, I came back to school to help students complete the interactive assignment I gave them. When it comes to me, I feel as though I have learned a lot myself through pursuing this idea for change. I have always had a fear or anxiety when it came to the presenting aspect of a presentation. I often really enjoyed the part of creating it but was nervous about this other half. On the day of my presentations, I definitely felt that nervousness, since I have never presented to this magnitude. Though going into the first presentation, I was able to present with confidence I have not felt before. I believe this is due to my big passion for creating slideshow presentations. Therefore, I really felt a need to inspire the students, as I hoped doing so would cause some to develop a passion too. I really feel like the presentation aspect went well since this was not something concrete like the slideshow aspect.

While I was at my old school piloting my project, all of the students seemed to be very attentive and engaged throughout every portion of my project. When I was presenting my slideshow, almost all of the students gave me their undivided attention. Most of those students visibly looked interested in the information I was presenting as well. When I gave my demonstration, students were visible and even audibly impressed by the features I showed. For example, I gave a step-by-step tutorial of how to create a graphical art element of a laptop only using shapes. Most students in each class appeared to be very impressed with the features and tools I demonstrated. Many claimed they were unaware that these existed or have never considered their use in these ways. And when it came time to explain their assignment, no one seemed to dread that they had more work to do. Instead, they got right into and directed their attention to creating their own slideshow. The purpose of this assignment was to give a historical measurement of the interest and effort students put into their work. Below see Figure 11, or in my portfolio under “project”, (https://sites.google.com/view/freemanengl2089/project). This is a collage of some of the impressive work from students in the three different classes. It features either the students title slide or information slide which shows their own creative implementation of the rules and examples I gave. Their effort really shows that the majority of these students took interest in the concept of creating proper slideshows.

As well as this, I gave students an ending survey when they had to complete before they submitted their assignments, where 26 students responded. The first question asked “Do you plan to experiment with Google Slides now that you've seen its possibilities?”, where the possible responses were “Yes!”, “No.”, and “Maybe…”. The reason I posed this question was to better understand if students seem to be willing to experiment with the possibilities they saw. Since this was one of my biggest goals, to present the importance and the possibilities of slideshow presentations, and to inspire students to take them further themselves. The results of this question, see Figure 12, are as follows; 76.9% said “Yes!”, 23.1% said “Maybe…”, and no one responded “No.”. This is a great result as it shows the majority of students seem to be interested in continuing their journey with slideshows, and a quarter seem to be considering it. Which is certainly a relative improvement when compared to the similar questions I asked in my survey.

The next question asked students “When creating slideshows in the future will you,” either “use a template or theme” or “design your own theme and practice your skills”. I asked this question to really push a major working piece of my goal. Where I strongly encouraged students to experiment with their own creativity by not using available pre-generated templates when making slideshow presentations. The results for this question, see Figure 13, was an astounding 100% for “design your own theme and practice your skills.” and no responses for “use a template or theme”. This question was meant to remind students of this important consideration, so that they will hopefully honor it in the future.

Then I asked “Do you better understand the importance and possibilities of slideshow presentations?”, with responses “Yes, definitely”, “No, not really”, and “Mostly”. I posed this question to get a grasp on what students felt that they took from my project. For the results, also see Figure 14; “Yes, definitely” had 69.2% of responses, “Mostly” had 30.8%, and “No, not really” had no responses. These responses are really telling, and they provide verification that one part of my goal, the importance of slideshow presentations, was certainly achieved.

The final question in the form of a short answer asked “Did you learn something new about Google Slides or digital design that you found interesting? If so what, and why?” I asked this question to provide a way for students to share their own thoughts and ideas when it came to how they learned from my project. In summary, most of each student’s responses listed one particular feature they didn’t know about or found interesting. Looking over these responses was very telling of the change my project brought these students. To read the full list of responses, go to my portfolio, where they are listed under “Project Evaluation” (https://sites.google.com/view/freemanengl2089/project/project-evaluation).

Overall, I am very satisfied with how my project and goal for change turned out. I have a strong feeling it was able to convince students to continue to practice these skills in the future. As well as to continue to evolve their knowledge and a better understanding of the importance and potential of slideshow presentations.

Conclusion

From beginning with a broad area for change and narrowing it down to a focused point in a community where it is needed. Conducting a survey of members in my community and interviewing a prominent stakeholder. Writing a literature review and learning valuable information from the source I researched. Implementing and executing my project in the community where I wanted to make change. The development of my project over the journey of this course has been successful. My ultimate goal of this project was to introduce the importance and possibilities of slideshow presentations to students in three information technology classes at my previous high school. I believe all of the students at least picked up the potential that programs like Google Slides have. Some of these students will undoubtedly go further by exploring and practicing that potential. In fact, I noticed this throughout my time at the school and when reviewing what students created for their assignments. When it comes to me, I feel as though I have learned a lot myself through pursuing this idea for change. I have always had a fear or anxiety when it came to the presenting aspect of a presentation. I often really enjoyed the part of creating it but was nervous about this other half.

Though, on the day of my presentations, I definitely felt that nervousness, since I have never presented like this before. I really felt a need to inspire the students, as I hoped doing so would inspire some to develop a passion. It is understated how useful this format of presentations can be, with so many options to enhance the transferring of information or ideas to others. My advice is to keep trying and never give up, you hear it all of the time because it is absolutely true. Go out there and make a difference that others will benefit from, it’s worth it. Beginning this course, I was pretty nervous about how I was going to help make a difference in a community. Nevertheless, I stuck through it and did my best to develop something I was proud of, and the results and experience itself are incredibly valuable to me now. I could already notice the difference I brought to my community, which was an incredible feeling.

Works Cited

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Shibli, Dom. “Using Cognitive Load Theory to Improve the Use of Slideshow Presentations and Support a More Efficient Learning Process.” Blended Learning In Practice, 2019, https://www.herts.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/246691/BLiP-Spring-2019-Final-Published.pdf#page=50.

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