Microsoft Office PowerPoint Website
This website gives a little information about the program itself and a list of related sites that a user might find helpful for enhancing the overall usefulness of the program itself.
Both of these sites offer multiple hot links to tutorial websites specifically about how to create PowerPoint presentations.
Power Point presentations are available for viewing once the eighth grade students in class investigated which brand of chocolate chip cookies contained the most chocolate during four 45 minute class periods. Microsoft Excel and Power Point were used for the first time to calculate their findings. Bill Burrall also answers some questions in how to assess Power Point presentations.
These PPTs were done by 6th graders. They did these after some extensive research on the scientists. They were done in conjunction with oral presentations. The site was last updated on 1/21/98. Some of the links no longer work, but those that were checked, that do still work, were very impressive. They use clip art and other design tools very effectively.
About 45 PPTs are at this site. They are about the lives of the students who wrote them. They are cute and fun to read, although the students sometimes used text colors that make it difficult to read. These were done in computer class. Those that are particularly good are: Derek Kim Zack Phillip's PPt is a good example of what can happen when a student uses only clip art and no text.
Mr. York's 5th grade webpage has several PPTs on it. Of these, Paul Revere is good. Actually the use of the PPT tools used is great for a 5th grader. Tamerlane is also extraordinary for a 5th grader. It is a little hard to read because of the size of the PPT slide presentation, but there is a text-only button that is marked with an "A" below the slides. The best one of all of these students' projects is Molly Pitcher.
Project - PowerPoint Presentations
Excellent work here by older students. No description is given as to the age of the students. They could be in college! Still, these are pretty good PPTs.
Really well done PPTs. These were done on careers. They represent a good use of clip art and text on this subject.
Ackley, Timothy E. Ph.D. Primary Instructor. Scholastic, January/February, 1999.
Two articles by Timothy E. Ackley, Ph.D. deal directly with the use of multimedia presentations in classrooms. These articles appear on pages 70-75 of this issue. The first article is entitled, “Amazing Educational Possibilities”. In this article he states that multimedia presentations are excellent for use in today’s classrooms. He gives many helpful hints for creating “learner friendly” presentations that will “Wow” students but not overstimulate them so that they miss the point. In the next article called “Child-Friendly Presentation Programs”, Dr. Ackley tells about having students create their own presentations with PowerPoint and other programs. He suggests PowerPoint for use with older elementary students. He says it can be used with primary students, but works better with older children. He like that the students can even include Excel spreadsheets in math presentations if they use the PowerPoint program.
"Enlivening that First Day." NEA Today Sept. 1998: 24.
A high school teacher uses PowerPoint to present introductory material on the first day of school.
Holzberg, Carol S. "Little Kids, Big Projects." Technology and Learning Oct. 1997: 42-45.
Elementary students at Cuba Elementary and at other schools used PowerPoint and to produce online computer books.
"Making It Presentable: A Step-By-Step Guide to Creating a Presentation with Microsoft PowerPoint 97." Microsoft PowerPoint: PC/Novice Learning Series Sept. 1998: 80-95.
This thorough article gives detailed steps on how to create a PowerPoint presentation. This is an excellent source for teachers and students.
"Turn Word Outlines into PowerPoint Presentations." PC/Computing July 1997: A22.
This article explains step-by-step how to create PowerPoint presentations from Word documents.
White, Jacci Wozniak and Vicki Howard Norwich. Computer Activities for College: Algebra and Precalculus. ERIC_NO: ED412119.
This article stresses the importance of how mathematics software can be a great aid in helping students understand difficult mathematics concepts. Power Point was highly recommended in helping students learn such concepts as functions, vertical line test and domain, Pascals’s triangle, binomial expansion, and pattern recognition. Microsoft Power Point was also recommended for solving higher degree inequalities by factoring and graphing, along with reviewing quadratic functions.
Jennie Redmond, Media Specialist of Calhoun County High School-St. Matthews, SC
She suggests using PowerPoint presentations as self-paced tutorials for students who have missed classes due to illness, etc. or are in need of review/remediation. This way the student can spend extra time mastering concepts he/she is weak in, or the student can use study periods to catch up on lessons that he/she missed without having to rely on other student’s notes as a sole source of missed material.
Mary Jo Springs, Media Specialist of Bethlehem Elementary School-St. Matthews, SC
She suggests having presentations that are given year after year in library classes made into PowerPoint presentations. Reference usage and other library skills that are taught over and over could be readily available for use with a short amount of advanced notice required for preparation. Again these lessons could be used by students on their own time when they have missed the lesson or are in need of remediation. Having PowerPoint presentations about favorite books or for special observances (like Black History, Women’s History, American Education Week, etc.) would also be useful.
Bibi Atkins, Media Specialist of Chapin Middle School - Chapin, SC.
Along with two teachers at CMS, Ms. Ray and Ms. Frick, Bibi Atkins and Holly Waters worked with students on a Power Point project for social studies in January. Students researched Progressivism, Black Progressivism, and famous figures of WWI in South Carolina. With the information that the students found, they created Power Point Presentations. These were presented in front of the class by using the AverKey Converter to show the presentations on the television. Students presentations contained information, animation, sounds, and various images from clip art and the Internet.
Group MembersDebra Rogers rogers@intrstar.net
Lillie Davis media_one40@htomail.com
Holly Waters hollywaters@yahoo.com
Deborah Holmes deholmes@Aiken.k12.sc.us
Sally Hursey shursey@upstate.net
Lisa Kendrick lisak@emeraldis.com
Regina Taylor hoorahgina@aol.com