William F. Garrity

EDUCAUSE's  truly useful "7 Things You Should Know About..." series publishes about contemporary presentation tools. 

7 Things You Should Know About Next-Generation Presenation Tools

Scenario

Alexia is working toward a bachelor’s degree in security management, and several of her courses require students to make team presentations. She has been closely watching her classmates’ presentations, determined to find ways to capture her peers’ attention and stand out from the group. She pays particular attention to the presentations by fellow members of her project team because she will soon be joining them in making their first joint presentation. In previous experiences, she has seen considerable time lost exchanging and managing different versions of files, often across applications and operating systems. As a result, she begins investigating online presentation tools, hoping to find an application that supports collaboration, is accessible by all team members, and is free to use. 

When the team meets to work on the project, Alexia proposes using a presentation tool based on the idea of a single “canvas” rather than a sequence of slides. The group will be explaining how facial-recognition software analyzes images. Using the tool she is recommending, Alexia is able to link to and reference the work of the leading scholars in the field. Because Alexia will be sharing this presentation online, she is confident that some in her audience will explore the links she embeds. She places the image of a human face at the center of the working area and begins to label the features around it. Team members can put explanations and web links further out on the canvas. This organizational approach allows the face to serve as the central point of the presentation and helps clarify how additional information is related to it. The application lets presenters zoom in on each explanation as needed and follow links to online demonstrations of how the facial-recognition software works— and how it can be fooled. The group divides the canvas into four regions and places their comments, images, videos, and links in their respective areas.

Alexia’s part of the presentation comes last, and she solicits questions from the class. As she and her team members respond, she moves around the presentation canvas to highlight various resources as they are needed for explanation. At one point she fields an advanced question and is able to go to original work to find the answer. The tool allowed the team to develop the presentation smoothly and efficiently, and the nonsequential nature of the tool—and the fact that the audience can follow on their own computers—results in a richer experience by allowing the discussion to guide the presentation in unplanned directions.

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