Image from flickr user Greg_Careaga(CC-licensed)
With the semester creeping closer and closer and many of us frantically prepping new classes (or doing vital updates to existing classes), the topic of lecture slides invariably crops up. Are my slides really that useful to my students, or are they just a crutch for me? Should I use my old slides (with necessary minor updates)? Should I throw my slides out, and try something completely new? We are all aware that using lecture slides comes with some pretty problematic baggage. Personally, I’ve got to admit that I often feel a little academic guilt about using lecture slides – even though I’ve gone to great lengths to avoid “Crappy PowerPoint Syndrome” – CPS! (keep text to an absolutely minimum, no massive bullet point lists, lots of illustrative images, use slides to stimulate discussion, etc, etc, etc). But lets all be honest here, its unlikely that we’re going to completely change the way in which we deliver lectures. Lecture slides can be quite helpful for students (as well as a tool to keep our lectures focused and on track – and firmly out of the outskirts of crazy ramble town). But what if we could have the best of both worlds? Still present content digitally in lecture – but do it in such a way that it isn’t the same old linear, slide after slide filled with bullet points and the occasional image.
In the spirit of these questions, Prof. Hacker is kicking off a series of posts called “Challenging the Presentation Paradigm” – each post will explore a piece of software (or a technique) that can help you change the way you deliver lecture material in class.
First up is Prezi (http://prezi.com/).
Coming from a little start-up in Hungary, Prezi is a web app (Flas/Flex based) that lets you author and deliver what they call “zooming presentations.” The description is apt, as Prezi presentations aren’t actually based on a the traditional linear slide model. Instead, Prezi embraces a zooming user interface model in which blocks of content are arranged contextually in relation to other blocks of content – and the user can zoom in and out of the content, alternating between a “big picture” view and a “detail” view (check out the website for lots of examples – or check out the embedded example below). In addition, you can layer content in such a way that there are several orders of zooming – zooming into a block of content, then zooming into a picture within that block (so it fills the whole frame), and then zooming into the picture so you can see a specific detail.
Prezi offers the opportunity to present content not as chunks whose relationship is only maintained by the fact that they strung together in a linear fashion, but as content that is logically related sets and subsets that are connected in a very spatial manner (and can be navigated non-linearly).
Because Prezi is a web app, all of the presentations you create are stored (and accessed) online. Normally this might present a problem if there were an unstable internet connection in the picture. However, Prezi gives you the ability to present offline (basically just saves the file locally).
Like a lot of other web apps these days, Prezi has a tiered pricing scheme – with a free version (limited storage, Prezi branding on all of your slides, and no way to manage view permissions), a basic version which costs € 39/ year (more storage, no Prezi branding), and a pro version € 119/ year (even more storage, enhanced permission control, and an offline editor). Personally, I think that the offline authoring tool that comes with the Pro account is probably the most compelling feature that Prezi offers.
Prezi isn’t without its drawbacks. First off, as mentioned earlier, if you want the offline authoring tool, you’ve got to shell out € 119/ year (not cheap by any stretch of the imagination). I’d rather author Prezi presentations in a desktop app than on the web, so this is a big deal for me. Second, the very nature of Prezi (remember, its a web app) means that you aren’t going to get the kind of crazy high quality presentation you can get with purely desktop based slide authoring apps (I use Apple Keynote – and always produce HD quality slides). Thirdly, Prezi’s authoring UI (toolbox/menu pictured below) takes some getting used to. I think that it could probably have done with a little more time in the oven (and associated testing – especially with instructors) before it was released.
The Prezi menu/UI toolbox can be a little counter-intuitive
All in all, I’m of the opinion that Prezi’s has far more in the way of good than bad. Used properly, I genuinely think that it has the potential to change the way in which we deliver lecture content the classroom.
Have you tried Prezi? If so, please share your impressions. If you haven’t, sign up for the free account and give it a whirl – and be sure to come back and kick in your .02 ¢ to the discussion.
22 Comments
Great post; I’m looking forward to the rest of the series.
Ethan, I’m a huge fan of Prezi and have been using it for about six months now. It’s a wonderful new paradigm for presenting and the tools – in their most basic form – are perfect for structuring a better presentation.
I think one of the problems Prezi has is helping users understand how to use the tools at the very early stages – in the right way.
I’ve just started a Prezi wiki manual to help people start learning (and teaching) the tool. Let me know what you think!
http://prezimanual.wiki.zoho.com/
Great post! I think it has tremendous potential in academic institutions!
Great idea for a series of posts. I’m a new reader of this site, but it has quickly become one of my favorites. As a new(ish) professor, I find it not only interesting but highly motivating as well. Thanks!
After reading your review, I went and signed up. I am in the process of creating my first presentation, but it looks like I can toss my ppt slides this semester … finally. I’ve always used them with illustrations and as place markers for my lecture, but this will serve me better and not be as … well, boring. Hats off to you for bringing this to my attention!
Ethan, I know a lot of teachers use SmartBoards or similar types of interactive white boards. I do a series of presentations each week @The SmartBoard using Prezi. Here’s an example: http://www.youtube.com/tippingpointlabs#play/all/uploads-all/2/TdSmzod5gdE Thanks, Drew
that’s an incredibly cool approach…Prezi + smartboard. Thanks for sharing!
My pleasure. I’m really hoping to improve the quality of a user’s first Prezi presentation. Posts like yours are wonderful! Thanks for elevating the concept!
I spent some time with Prezi earlier this summer when preparing for a campus visit/job talk. The first thing that I noticed was that, as Ethan suggests, the tool has a definite learning curve. And even once you know what’s going on, you aren’t going to be able to throw together a presentation in 10 minutes, as I can do when using Keynote or PowerPoint. (I’ll grant you that they might not be the best presentations ever, but for slide shows these tools are very quick and good at what they do.)
An even bigger discovery was how the tool forced me to think differently about the paradigm of presentation. I was no longer working with individual slides, but with a large canvas on which to work. Organizing materials required me to devote significant time to thinking about layout, transitions, and the like.
Of course, since this was for a job talk, I wanted things to be perfect. And I was very pleased with the results. Using it in a classroom setting would hopefully be easier.
yup, all of these things – the learning curve, required paradigm shift, etc. – mean that Prezi is not something that you should dive into if you don’t have a good chunk of time. Instead of going whole hog and switching over all of my lectures in all of my classes, I’m going to do one or two (choose a topic that is most appropriate) and then build up from there.
I wonder what the point of diminishing return for Prezi is. At what point does it just replace PowerPoint? I’m hazarding a guess, but I’m inclined to think that I would want to just use it once or twice a semester to preserve the wow factor, as well as not kill myself with the work that would be involved in all of the presentations.
Also, have you purchased the full subscription, Ethan? Can you give us a review of the offline editor? Or is it the same as the online one?
nope – haven’t purchased a full subscription…its way too much when all I really want the offline editor (I don’t care about most of the other stuff). I just watched the intro video they’ve got on their site to get an idea of how it works. Frankly, I think they should polish up the tool, and sell the offline editor as a standalone desktop app. I’d buy it.
That presentation is very well done! You have put a little fear in me, though, that I will never be able to get mine to do that. Ah, well, that’s what this weekend is for, wasn’t planning anything else anyway. Thanks for the link!
I want to like Prezi, I really, really do. I’ve tried so hard to like it. I’ve gone through the tutorials, explored the best practices, and have worked on my own Prezi presentations. After all that, I have reached this conclusion: everything that critics like Edward Tufte say about PowerPoint applies to Prezi as well, and then some.
It’s not just that there’s a steep learning curve; it’s not just that the undo features are all but useless; it’s not just that it takes an inordinate number of mouse clicks to edit anything; it’s not just that it’s impossible to throw together a quick but effective presentation a few minutes before class. The real problem is this: Prezi is worse than PowerPoint when it comes to what I call style entrapment. In other words, a usable (not even to mention an effective) Prezi presentation depends so much on getting the arrangement of content right that the content itself is overlooked.
Yes, Prezi has a “wow factor” — but that wowness (for lack of a better word) wears off quickly, and whatever visual rhetoric even the most skilled Prezi designer might employ is no substitute for the other kinds of rhetoric that go into effective presentations.
In the final analysis, a slide show is a slide show is a slide show.
Mark, Great insight. If you don’t mind I’d like to address some of your points:
1) You’re right there is a steep learning curve, but the key lies in using the quick keys – which significantly reduces the number of clicks required. However, it’s much faster than PowerPoint, in my opinion, but it takes a new mind shift to use the tool. Show me don’t tell me is the power here.
2) Content organization – You’re right. Content organization is the key to a great presentation. Overlapping concepts (for early users circles are the key here) is actually what makes the tool powerful. Zooming and moving for the sake of moving is useless. The arrangement of the content works best when you’re working organically. Using the organization of the content to help tell the story.
3) The Wow Factor – perfect description of the current use of the tool. I do think that you are more likely to create an effective presentation in Prezi than in Powerpoint if you re-think the entire process.
Absolutely, a slideshow is a slideshow. Prezi is much deeper than a slideshow. The relationship of the ideas is the key to a great presentation.
Anyway, great comment! Very insightful.
Thanks for these pointers. I agree with others here that the wow factor will likely decrease over time as more people are exposed to Prezi. The zooming transitions are just fancy versions of PowerPoint transitions–if one moves linearly thought a presentation. It’s the nonlinearity of Prezi’s interface that interests me and makes me think it adds value beyond the wow factor. The ability to lay out one’s content visually, using (almost) any arrangement that makes sense given the content, and then to move through that content any way you like at will–that’s pretty cool stuff.
Thank you Ethan and all for the good discussion. I used Prezi extensively at the end of the spring semester in three different courses. The primary reason that I switched to Prezi was to break out of the rut of keynote presentations. I too try to avoid the perils of CPPS, but by week 10 in a semester it all becomes just a bit too familiar. Moreover, my students, who were required to lead class sessions or present on their own work at various points, all seemed over-professionalized in their use of powerpoint or keynote. Of course I was trying to model a more engaged practice, and I did offer critiques of their presentations, but I think that students, like most people, learn that a few bullet points are a lot easy to slap on a page than thinking through interesting ways to raise points. So I tried Prezi for the wow factor (which it got, even after a few presentations to the same classes) but kept using it because it allows me to be more flexible with the material. It can take ages to make a well-considered prezi, but mostly because the format invites you to think through the relationships between the various materials you are trying to get across. At the same time, I especially like the ease with which one can take detours in the non-linear format offered by Prezi, and have even taken to often working in front of the class in edit mode so that we can add and modify things as we go. I do plan to mix up the format this semester, projecting from keynote, prezi, the class website, and other materials so that we can all remember that there are lots of ways to get content across, and that no one tool is the answer to every situation.
Prezi’s neat! Reminds me of the drawing program Rita also. HyperStudio also does this on the local machine, which means it’s fast, and lots of media can be put in place.
This is really interesting; thank you for sharing.
I’m a university lecturer who teaches (among other things) about the visual system, and I’m interested in attention. I’ve been trying to use lecture slides differently for a while now, but this is a whole new way of thinking about it, and I’m going to try to see if I can incorporate Prezi into some of my teaching. To me it’s very similar to a mind-map, which I would love to use as a visual aid if I thought my students would understand my scrawl and odd aides memoire.
Because of how we teach where I work, and the courses I teach on, I don’t normally see one class more than once or twice, so I guess that would preserve the elusive ‘wow factor’.
One thing that does give me pause is how students might reasonably take notes from a class given like this; the linear structure of their notetaking (a linearity constrained by the flow of time) is necessarily not going to match the structure of the presentation itself. At least if they can access it online, that’s potentially less of an issue.
On the whole, intriguing. Thanks!
— Chris.
I’m of the mind that “wow” has pedagogical value – immersion and and engagement are important…and compelling visual design can get you there.
I enjoyed reading that other educators are finding Prezi. You’re readers might enjoy my blog post “How to Embed a Prezi Presentation in Your Blog” http://bit.ly/fhEVt
How do you re-run the above Prezi? None of the controls reset the Prezi to the first “slide” or screen.
I have found that Prezi is very fussy about picture importing… it may or may not import a photo… try again and it may. No error message, just no picture.
Like others, I wanted to like Prezi. But it’s too clumsy!
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