Chapter 4: Ringing CHIMES

            In this chapter, “Ringing CHIMES²,” the author states that effective communication accomplishes two objectives. First, effective communication needs to get the audience’s attention. One needs to attract, but not distract from your message. Second, a presentation needs to stick in the minds of the listeners.

            The author created an acronym, CHIMES², to emphasis how to create a presentation effective:

            Connections: How does the presenter make a personal connection with the audience?

            Humor: Laughter adds to the overall enjoyment and engagement of your presentation.

            Images: Visually appealing images help to draw the audience to your message.

            Music: The use of music adds a visceral experience to the viewer’s experience.

            Emotion: An appeal to the listener’s gut helps the viewer retain more information.

            Story: An appeal to the traditional sense of linear development helps provide order to the listener’s understanding.

            Senses: A multi-sensory presentation helps the audience retain more of the information presented.

            In this chapter, I learned that one’s presentation needs to be carefully planned to insure that audience becomes more than a viewer but an active, engaged participant in your presentation.

Chapter 1: Tweaking presentations

           The author’s objective is to make PowerPoint presentations more lively, powerful, and unforgettable and rid the presenter and the viewer of the boredom that permeates so many million of presentations that occur everyday. In Chapter One, the author focuses on three categories: templates, color, and type.

            First, template like and artist’s canvas should not distract from the message. The template should help support the content not compete against it.  As a result, one should eliminate all distractions in their template that take away from the content presented.

            Next, color. Per the author’s research color helps increase understanding and retention of information presented over black and white on several levels. First, color increases viewer willingness to read by 80%. Second, color helps to boost participation and motivate the audience in the presentation by 80%. Third, color increases learning and retention by 75%. Finally, color outsells black and white in advertising by 88%.

            In addition, presenters should be aware of the audience and its color preferences and, in turn, color should be consistent with the message you are trying to convey.

            Finally, type.  When composing a slide, the less words, the better to communicate effectively. In addition, it also important to consider the typeface used and the presentation of information to insure that the viewer is able to read and retain the information quickly.

            In this chapter, the author made several sound points about how I may enhance my PowerPoint presentations that will help my students and colleagues to be better able to read and retain the information that I would present.

My Learning Experience with Copyright

The Copyright Crash Course by Georgina K. Harper made me aware of so many regulations regarding copyright. At the beginning, it was kind of confusing because it mentions the TEACH Act and different sections of the Copyright Act and policy. It took me more than a simple scan to understand it. The most important piece of information that I learned is that as an educator I am able to use material that is related to the curriculum to share with my students.