power point for newbies

I have always used PowerPoint for class presentations etc. but never done anything more than simply slide after slide with a little information, a little color and a few pictures. I found these articles about good and bad presentations to be very helpful with discovering my hidden abilities with power point. I never understood the concept, less is more, when making a power point presentation. I now know NOT to incorporate a ridiculous amount of wording and information into my slides. Keeping it short, simple, and to the point will allow for a much more effective presentation. Using actual photos of people on slides never occurred to me either. I was not aware that it can help the audience connect better with the presentation instead of putting clip art or some other kind of animation. The "Top Ten Slide Tips" by Garr Reynolds was, in my opinion, the most helpful slide. This dealt with the actual presentation itself and gave the most successful tips.
1. Keep it simple. 2. limit bullet points and text. 3. limit transitions. 4. use high quality graphics. 5. have a visual theme. 6. use charts. 7. use color well. 8. use fonts well. 9. use video or audio (I like that one!) 10. Spend time in the slide sorter "so you can see how the flow of your presentation is progressing" (Reynolds).

I always hated it when someone was reading off of the power point as if they were reading a book. I tried to avoid doing the same thing but after reading through these various tips on PowerPoint, perhaps I was making the same mistakes that my fellow classmates were. We shall see!


-Drewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

Exceling in Excel

I had no idea that the new excel could be so useful. I was never a big fan of using it on class projects and avoided it whenever possible. Now I feel confident that even if i didn't know or remember how to do something, I know enough about excel to figure it out. I had taken a small time computer class in high school but basically learned nothing. I am also really excited about my skill level with excel. I feel exceptionally comfortable when using it and have full confidence in my abilities to navigate and speed/efficiency. I would have never guessed that excel made life so easy, such as various formula options. Making a fixed cell reference is also extremely useful and conserves a great deal of time. I am a business major so excel will be used a great deal later on in classes. Excel has been the most interesting part of the year so far, perhaps because this is where I learned the most. I have already begun to use it in order to track the amount of money I am spending on a weekly basis.

Looking forward to PowerPoint!


-Drew

Pictures gone awry

The picture that I chose is a digital photo of a soldier in Basra. I chose this picture because I believe that this is a very harmful type of digitally enhanced photo. It seems that the media will do anything to paint a bad picture of the war, in order to meet the U.S. populace need for justice. The picture was taken by Brian Walski, who was later fired for digitally enhancing this particular photo. It was altered by Walski taking two photographs and editing them together to look like the same picture. No doubt it was manipulated to show the harshness of soldiers against the people of Iraq in order to instill inspiration or anger or any sort of emotion from someone who would have seen this picture. The manipulation was indeed harmful. It was harmful to the solider, harmful to the inspiration of the war and harmful to anyone who read about or saw the picture because it may have skewed their views. (Taken the truth away from the populace).

-drew

AT&T Center for Learning and Technology trip

I did not know that the CLT existed and I was really surprised when I first read about it. Although I'm a first year I thought that I pretty much had the campus and all that it includes pretty much figured out. I thought the Digital Audio Lab was nice to have with all the features it came with. It is really convenient that you can record music or any other audio to incorporate into your projects (saves A LOT of time from how I used to do it and makes them more exciting). Also, all of the computers available in the CLT are very useful. I was not aware of the fact that there were so many other computers in the library outside of the third floor. A lot of time the computers are full and I didn't think that there was anywhere else to go. Now I know! The CLT can also be very useful for group projects. If I am able to learn more about computers in general and especially how to work the ones in the CLT to the greatest advantage I firmly believe that the CLT would perhaps turn into the the most useful area in the library.


Drewwwwwww