Microsoft PowerPoint

Make a presentation more fun

Hi!

Introduction

The world today includes so much technology. Sometimes I think it can be too much and that maybe we are getting a bit lazy and we lay our trust on the technology. We don’t occasionally have time to learn a technology before a new comes. But I also think that technology can bring so much help into our lives and makes it easier to live it. The uses of technology in schools today are different depending on money, experiences and resources etc. One ICT resource that can be used of all schools with computers is PowerPoint. You don’t need an internet connection to use it and it’s easy to learn.

The program

PowerPoint is a program that can make presentations and introduction more alive, interesting and fun. In the program you can make different pages and functions to show or introduce a theme or work. How you use it is easy, in the program you make “pages”. You can insert text, pictures and diagrams etc. You can make a more visual description, with colors and animations. When you are using your PowerPoint presentation you can have the “pages” timed so it changed itself but you can also changed “page” with a simple “click” with your computer mouse. The things that are required so you can be able to use PowerPoint are the program (PowerPoint) that is launched by Microsoft and you also need a computer.

How/why to use it in schools

PowerPoint can be used of almost every age, but it can be a bit tricky for younger learners to manage it. My thoughts of who is going the use the program is not just the learners, teacher can also have a great use of it. The students can use it as help to report a work that they have been created. There are some reasons why it is good for the students to use PowerPoint. One is that the students have a stable background and a pretty good “cheat sheet” to look at for help. When I have work with it in school the attitude from the learners has been very positive. Their creativity has been shown and also their knowledge. Some topics that can be presented are: the story of me, my favorite animal, country facts or another resource of something. This is not the only one that PowerPoint can be used for; there are a lot of topics that can be presented. A reason why teacher should use is that give the student a fairer introduction, the information can get clearer and you can print out handouts to the students so they can make notes on it.

My final thoughts

PowerPoint can be a good way to give a presentation both for teachers and students. That which make it so good is that it does not require a lot of money to get it, and computers is the only other technique that are acquired. When teacher use the same programs as the students, I think the student’s attitude gets better. We have to let the students get more involved and listen to their thoughts about stuff. PowerPoint may be a good ICT resource to use but must not forget that there are a lot of other ICT resources that can make our teaching and learning more fun and clearer.

// Ida Bengtsson