Powe Point Presentation Tips

After checking out each website, they all offered different ways to approaching power point presentations. Simplicity is key. When a power point has too many distractions, it takes away from the viewer's concentration. When it is simple and organized, information is easy to read and your ideas are aware to the viewer. Along with simplicity comes minimal bullet points and text. Reading makes the viewer tired and bored of what he or she is watching. The viewer is watching a presentation, not reading a book. Therefore, either read to the audience or let them read. They can either listen to you talk or read from the slide; not both. Furthermore, animations are attractive but it is wise not to add too many. Keep the transitions consistent and appropriate.

The design and pictures added to the power point are also essential to a well prepared presentation. Avoid using pre-made templates and background designs. Try to add an appropriate template that is unique to you. Make sure graphs and charts are used adequate with your information. Organize the charts neatly and color-organized. This makes analyzing your data easier. Along with the design, make the fonts suitable and readable. Simple and large font is easy to they eye even though they may not look as fancy.

Sound effects and videos are good when used wisely. Do not use sound effects given to you, rather take them off a CD or online. This will ensure uniqueness and creativeness.

My 5 Guidelines:

1.) limit the amount of text on each slide.
2.) keep the background design consistent and on topic. (do not use pre-made templates)
3.) keep animations appropriate and use them wisely. Too many childish animations looks corny.
4.) use legible fonts that are adequate size.
5.) Make graphs and charts organized throughout the slide to defend your point more thoroughly.

CLT Visit

Before our visit to the CLT center, i never knew about it. I found it to be a great place to study, work on projects, and use new technology. I wonder how come more students do not use that place because the computers are nicer and more applications are available. I will use the CLT center to complete major projects especially in my Entrepreneurship seminar and management of organizations class. I have 2 major projects in that class and the CLT center can be very helpful in making my project better. I was also informed of a music room. That is a great place to record music, mix music, and sing music. I would love to experiment with all the new technology there. I am also not comfortable woking with Macs. The CLT center is a great place to adventure into a Mac and learn about how to use it and all it's features.

Excel

Coming in to this class, i did not know anything about excel. I was always timid to use it because charts, graphs, and data always confused me and I did not know how to work it. I was also unaware of all the functions and formulas used to make the data accumulate. I am now proud to say I am confident in using excel. I learned many new things with excel. For starters, how to create SUM,AVERAGE, IF, and many more functions and formulas. I also learned how to add charts and spreadsheets into the excel page. I feel that this will be helpful in the future when i am presenting information and determining data. Being a business major, I know that i will have to use excel with future jobs and internships. Having knowledge with how to use excel will definitely be a advantage.

I also learned how to copy and paste data from excel into power point presentations and word documents. This special copy and paste feature is extremely important because presenting a creative and thorough power point is always good. Knowing a lot of key features with excel will help me organize and retrieve data a lot easier. Formatting cells and being able to use absolute cell reference saves time.

In conclusion, i came into this class with no knowledge of excel and am leaving feeling confident and intelligent when working with excel. I am glad we touched upon the topic of excel because being a business major this will come in handy very often!!

Chris Nolan's Visit

I learned a lot of useful information from Chris Nolan. The newest information I learned was about how Google ranked the lists of websites in a keyword search. The ranking of Google searches are based on word phrasing, the amount of key words in the title of the web page, and the number of times other sites and search engines link to that site. I never really understood how certain web pages got to the top of the Google list. I was very surprised how easy it was to put false information of a website that is on the top 5 Google ranking list. For example, Chris Nolan showed us the site www.martinlutherking.com. The site sounds legit and correct, however, when analyzing the information on the site, it was racist, false, and harmful. Other websites similar to this are Wikipedia. I learned that anyone can put any information on the site and if enough people believe it, the information becomes "true." I also learned about the "cache" feature of Google. It is basically a copy of the page. This is useful because if the web page is not working, you can always use the cache site to gather local information of the page. This is just a handful of things i learned from Chris Nolan.

Photoshop Pictures

I chose the picture of O.J. Simpson on the cover of two magazines: "Newsweek" and "Time Magazine." The picture was taken in 1994 soon after the he was arrested for the murder of his wife. The picture originally is his mug shot. The first picture was clear, bright, and in color. It was manipulated for "Time Magazine" and changed into a black and white picture, darker in color, and a dark circle surrounded his face. It is manipulated to make him seem scary, guilty, and dark. The manipulated picture obviously wanted to influence the people into thinking that he is guilty for the murder of his wife. Yes, the manipulated picture is hurtful for O.J Simpson himself because it portrays a negative and fearful picture of him. However, it did not change the result of the trial.