Week 4 Readings

When thinking about PowerPoint and the multimedia principle as described in chapter three of ELSI, onoe thing in particular that caught my attention was the fact that graphics should support learning.  It occurs to me that in designing PowerPoint slides we sometimes have a tendency to select clipart and icons that are cute or catchy but don't necessarily reinforce the content being delivered in text and perhaps speech.  I also pondered the discussion in the Atkinson and Mayer article about how we have an inclination to format PowerPoint slides (or any multimedia, for that matter) in a certain way because the features within the program are most convenient or lend themselves to that particular formatting.  However, research shows that these ways of organizing and delivering content are not necessarily effective or appropriate according to cognitive learning theory.

I think that the best way to present the multimedia and contiguity principles to my colleagues would be to demonstrate contrasting good and bad examples.  Since PowerPoint is likely going to be the medium of choice for many of them, I would also show them a short YouTube video from Guy Kawasaki where he explains his 30 20 10 principle.  It's a great way to sum up the best practice for text on PowerPoint slides.

Barb's thoughts on Week 4 Readings

The Multimedia principal is best incorporated into e-learning when the learner has little or no prior knowledge of the topic. On page 69 the authors, Clark and Mayer (2008) summarize the principal, “Overall, we recommend that you be sensitive to the level of prior knowledge of your learners…they may be able to learn well mainly from text or even mainly from graphics.” I created a flash video explaining the use of this principal.
http://barbsedtech.com/edtech513/videos/mutlimediaprinciple-output/Web/mutlimediaprinciple

As for the contiguity principal the authors, Clark and Mayer (2008), explored two techniques of this principle and summarized them nicely on page 93-94. This link shows how I would explain it to a colleague:
http://barbsedtech.com/edtech513/videos/contiguityprinciple-output/Web/contiguityprinciple

Clark, R. C., and Mayer, R. E. (2008). E-learning and the science of instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning. Pfeiffer and Co.

The Atkinson and Mayer article, Five ways to reduce PowerPoint overload, reminded of another article I read called PowerPoint is evil by Edward Tufte which can be read by following this link: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/ppt2.html. It also appeared in the September 2003 issue of Wired Magazine. I’m proud to say that I have always taught my students to make their PowerPoint slides short and sweet. Use words that make the point right away and images that represent the words. Now, with Web 2.0 tools galore who needs Power Point (sorry Bill Gates).

Week 4 Readings

This week’s readings were very good and applicable immediately. I think most people, at least to a degree, have suffered from PowerPoint overload. We have been on the receiving end of it and have probably made more than a few students endure our own presentations that were, in hindsight, poorly put together.

The way I would go about defining and demonstrating these principles is, oddly enough, a PowerPoint presentation. I think it is important to show a good and a bad way. I would design a presentation that explains each of these principles, using the proper principles of course. After each point, I would take one of my own presentations for my classes and show both the traditional (or old fashioned or wrong ) way of presenting the material. I would explain why it was not a good slide Then, I would contrast that slide with one following the proper principle we were discussing at the time. At that time, I would try to encourage discussion on why the new slide is better than the old slide.

To close, I would explain to my colleagues that we have got to re-evaluate how we are teaching. When preparing a lesson, we have got to have these principles in mind and constantly eliminate the material causing an extraneous load on our students. In combining that line of thinking with these principles, I think our students would have a better overall learning experience

Week 4 Readings

There were two main points from the reading this week, it is better to have graphics in addition to words rather than just words and the graphics and their corresponding words need to be in close proximity. The article added to these points that segmenting information is important and that each segment needs a heading. Ultimately, all these principles are aimed at reducing cognitive overload.

The most concise way to explain these points to a colleague is through the phrases, 'less is more' and 'keep it simple'. All the principles discussed this week lead to reducing the amount of 'stuff' in a presentation, whether it is background images, text, extraneous information, not pertinent images, etc. Multimedia presentations need to be the minimum amount of 'stuff' needed to convey the necessary content. For example, a presentation slide with a heading and a pertinent graphic that serves a purpose past decoration simultaneously accompanied by spoken information should minimize cognitive overload.

PowerPoint type slide presentations are the most frequent offenders of these guidelines. I have seen many slide presentations that violate most of these principles. As the article stated, the abundance of cluttered slide presentations is due largely to the program and how it aides the creation of cluttered slides. I am certain that I am guilty of many of these presentation offenses.

Week 4 Readings - Christina Talley

It is important to realize that in the realm of multimedia and presentation for learning, less is often more. While it can be tempting to get bogged down in using the wide variety of creative features we now easily have at our fingertips, such as animations, videos, audio, and eye-catching graphics, these instruments can have the unpleasant side-effect of making material difficult to sift through.

Multimedia is important to include in a wide variety of works. It can be found everywhere, in all forms—from an interactive slideshow in a news article to a flash animation on a school website. When used correctly, it helps enhance and bring to life what would otherwise be a very bland block of text. As Atkinson and Mayer (2008) point out, it has been discovered by numerous studies that people learn more from text with graphics than text alone. Effective multimedia can be as simple as a photograph and as elaborate as an interactive learning simulation, but one must be careful to ensure the focus of the viewer is not distracted by what they are viewing.

Therefore, I sincerely believe—and would explain the process of adding multimedia to a colleague—that multimedia should only be used to support the base information being presented. A rule of thumb that I use is this: if the viewer’s attention is more on the type of multimedia that was used rather than the information being conveyed, it is probably not an effective application.

Week 4 Readings

I really appreciated the clear and straightforward manner of presenting information in this week’s readings. Clark and Mayer even defined three very simple terms--“words,” “graphics,” and “multimedia presentation”--so readers would understand those terms in the context of the textbook (ELSI, p. 56). Chapter 3 of ELSI, regarding the “Multimedia Principle,” was especially pertinent to my own immediate situation at work. The dilemma posed at the beginning of this chapter is the exact situation faced in my workplace (primarily by our clients): costs versus benefits of multimedia e-learning design. Graphics, especially custom simulations, DO require more time and money, and it can be difficult to justify the expense of the more elaborate designs. The discussion about static versus animated graphics was especially relevant, since the client for two of my current e-course projects is weighing the cost of having us produce new simulations versus using static images they already have. Of course, our flash programmers are chomping at the bit to create the cool simulations, but Chapter 3 certainly provides evidence to support the use of static images to promote learning. However, one aspect that was not really discussed in Chapter 3 was learner motivation. Figure 3.9 may be more effective at producing knowledge transfer than words alone, but it certainly didn’t motivate me to spend much time looking at it! I would like to know what the research says about motion as a motivating factor in graphics. My e-course projects at work will have bulleted text that slides onto the screen in time with the voiceover text, and I find that I pay much more attention to these bits of information that slide onto screen than the static text. What would the research say about learning with this type of design element?

Chapter 4 on the Contiguity Principle contained some solid information and examples about keeping text close to graphics. Likewise, the Atkinson and Mayer article on principles for Powerpoint design was clear and straight to the point. I am looking forward to reading more about the Modality Principle in the next chapter of ELSI, because I happen to prefer to read text on screen than to listen to narration. If I have the option of a transcript or audio, I will choose the transcript.

Week 4 Readings PowerPoint Tips

In conclusion to the Atkinson and Mayer article about reducing PowerPoint overload I found the information very interesting and helpful. If you think about it for years and years we have always been told how to write papers and make them meet the requirements of certain paper formats. As technology has improved over the years so has the use of PowerPoint. In the education field I would say that a good majority of teachers use PowerPoint on a regular basis. We are always trying to find ways to differentiate instruction. PowerPoint has been great to the world of educators but until reading this article I'm not sure I ever thought about how the PowerPoint should be formatted. I honestly just tried to make it the best, I figured if it looked good and was full of color and bullets than my students would find it interesting. As a teacher of students with disabilities I've probably been increasing the cognitive load with all this color and accidentally decreasing my chances of retention. I think Travis made a good comparison to on old acronym K.I.S.S. Keep it Simple Stupid. I really liked all 5 of the points that were made in the article. I really liked the first point about your title of the slide. I'm curious to go back and look at previous PowerPoints I've made and determine if the title is actually effective. I would be scared to view my presentations in Slide Sorter and see if the titles flow and tell a story. All of these points were very information and I know that this will help me develop much more effective PowerPoint presentations in the future.

Luke