PowerPoint Tips

After looking at the websites about PowerPoint, here are my guidelines for creating a good PowerPoint and hopefully avoiding a bad one.
1) Use professional graphics: The cheesy clip art selections provided by PowerPoint are childish and should not be used in an academic or professional field. I find the cheesy clip arts to be belittling and annoying.
2) Keep the slides simple: Too much information on one slide can be overwhelming to the audience.
3) Use color well: Colors can be used to convey emotions and can help you get your point across by using visual stimulants.
4) Use animation wisely: A little bit of animation is good, but too much can be distracting.
5) Vary the way you present the information: Use a mix of text, video, charts, or audio.

CLT

I loved getting to visit the CLT area in the library. I had been there a few times before for viewing films for classes, but I loved getting to learn about all the technology down there. I loved that it has both Mac and PC computers so that students have the ability to work with whatever they are most comfortable with or they can branch out and learn another computer's system. The technology that the computers have amazed me. If I ever have a project that involves some sort of media, sound, photoshop, or imaging, I will definitely use this multi-million dollar area. Thank you for taking us on that tour!

Excel

I loved learning about Excel. I had very little knowledge about how to work it and I greatly benefitted from learning about it in this class. I only wish I had known how to work in Excel earlier in my college career because I have had to use it in other classes. I loved learning how to put formulas in the cells and then use cell references to do the math for the rest of the spreadsheet. I also loved learning about charts and tables. Being able to analyze data and add color or a design was a great learning experience for me. I will definitely use Excel in the future for keeping track of my grades and expenses. I will also use it to analyze data for other classes or research. Excel is a key component for academic use and in the business world. Students can use Excel in an infinite amount of ways such as research, analyzing data, or keeping track of personal things. Businesses can use Excel to keep track of the financial aspects of the firm and to prepare presentations with data. Overall, my experience about Excel was extremely helpful and beneficial.

Chris Nolan's Presentation

I really enjoyed Chris Nolan's presentation. One thing that I learned was about what the website addresses and domains meant. I learned that .com is typically a company that is trying to sell something and that .org is an organization that could be a non-profit, church, political action committee, big corporation, or just a group of people in a basement. The legitimacy of the information on .com and .org websites needs to be checked and not fully trusted. Also I learned about .gov and .edu domains. The .gov websites mean that they are from the United States government. The information on these websites are very accurate, however they may be tainted by the bias of the current political party. The .edu websites are wonderful for scholarly or academic purposes because many of these websites are from colleges and universities. One thing that surprised me was that Google could make search engines in strange languages. They have themes such as Pig Latin and pirate. I loved what I learned from this presentation and I know that it will benefit my use of search engines such as Google.

Pictures that Lie

The picture that I chose was of a Great White Shark jumping out of the water apparently to attack the U.S. Air Force helicopter that seems to be in the middle of a rescue. I chose this picture because I have actually seen it somewhere before and thought it was real. When I first saw it, my fear of sharks grew and it made me sad to think that the U.S. Air Force soldier might not have lived through that kind of attack. The picture originated in 2001. It was manipulated by pasting a huge shark in the picture and the whole picture was turned around. It may have been manipulated to show how intense the work of the U.S. Air Force is or to convince people that sharks have naturally aggressive behavior toward humans. I do believe that the manipulation of this picture is harmful because it can strike fear in people's minds and gives a false view of the U.S. Air Force.

http://news.cnet.com/2300-1026_3-6033210-18.html?tag=mncol