Pages

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Thoughts on PowerPoint vs. Online Presentations

In traveling around the country giving genealogy presentations, I have experienced a wide variety of equipement failures and lack of Internet connectivity. Since my primary computers are Apple OS X based, I always have to worry about connectivity issues. It seems like each time I run into a problem, I add one more level of equipment and possible backup.

For example, for my recent presentations at RootsTech 2013, I came prepared with my MacBook Pro laptop, a Toshiba Windows 8 laptop, a flashdrive with my entire presentation, connectors for RGB (DB15 to DVI) and HDMI, and a number of cables including a surge protector and various charging cables for iPhone, iPad and the laptops. This has become my standard equipment.

Not only do I have to be ready for the presentations, I need to make sure I can use and charge all my devices during the time I am away from my home office.

Originally, I liked to do all my presentations live online using an Internet connection. However, in Springfield, Illinois, although I had access to two different WiFi cards and the hotel WiFi, none of them worked and I lost connection with the Interent in the middle of a presentation. I have learned from that experience and from many others that I cannot rely on having an Internet connection outside of a few very limited venues. This is the case no matter how adamant the conference organizers are that they have a good Internet connection or that their equipment was just tested the night before.

For that reason, about a year or so ago, I began to make PowerPoint presentations for all of my classes except those at the Mesa FamilySearch Library, where the connections are fairly predictable. In some cases, I have planned to do the presentation from a live connection, but had the PowerPoint presentation as a backup.

Using a PowerPoint is both confining and liberating. My wife likes to point out that having a PowerPoint keeps me on track for the presentation and moves through the information in a more orderly fashion. At the same time, I chaff at the confinement and lack of spontaneity of a PowerPoint presentation. Now, I almost always have my entire presentation on a flashdrive for the eventuality that my computers do not work with the location's pre-setup machines and I have to use their computers.

I am certainly not new to PowerPoint presentations. I have used the program since it was introduced back in the dim past of computers. There are several options to using Microsoft's program, but I have found that there is always a slight chance of failure of compatibility if I branch off into another program especially if I am forced to use the facility's computer.

I was looking at a presentation that I did about a year ago and I realized that using the program and thinking about what the audience is going to see, has dramatically changed how I design my slides and what I say. The biggest problem is keeping the slides synchronized with my every changing presentations, since I never say exactly the same thing twice in row. Another challenge is the change in technology. I have had online websites change during the time I was creating the presentation and it is not unusual for their to be several changes over the lifetime of one presentation. I always have to go back and carefully review the slides to update any screenshots I am using.

I must say that I have seen some truly awful PowerPoint presentations (including a few of my own). The biggest problem is usually too many words on one slide. I work on that every time I review an old presentation and update it. I am ambivalent about using "cute" or funny illustrations. In most cases, I feel that they detract from the subject matter of the presentation, but can be used effectively if they don't overload the viewers. I also think it is poor practice to stand in a presentation and read the text from a long slide. The slides should reinforce the presentation, not become the script.

I am still very much in the mode of evolving my presentations and I hope to get better as time goes on.

2 comments:

  1. If you haven't tried Keynote, it can be worth a look. I really like PowerPoint (in part because of the compatibility reasons you mentioned) but Keynote has ways to allow you to be less linear than PowerPoint.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you so much for sharing this post with your readers.

    ReplyDelete