Box Cake or Scratch Cake
My first recipe tried and tested from the Web 2.0 Recipe Book was Prezi. Prezi is widely promoted as the “new and improved” presentation tool.
Prezi drops the slideshow metaphor altogether in favor of a giant canvas onto which you can drop all your presentation material. You can then pan around the canvas, zooming in on text, images, videos and other multimedia objects. (Shepherd, 2009, p. 10)
Before this class commenced I had no experience with Prezi personally or professionally. I had never been to a presentation where I could remember the presenter using a Prezi. My first attempt at developing a Prezi presentation was for the assignment, An Autobiography of A Tech User. When I reflect back on my learning and how I navigated through the program I found it similar to making a cake straight from the box.
Box Cake Recipe
Step 1: Choose the flavor/layout
Step 2: Add all ingredients
Step 3: Once the batter is nice and smooth, no lumps of misplaced information or misspelled words, fill desired pans with batter
Step 4: Bake cake and create path for the best outcome, making sure to keep a close eye on cooking time and pathways (they can be tricky ☺)
Step 5: Cool and re-check editing and pathways
Step 6: Optional: add icing and sprinkles such as videos, photographs, or sound
Step 7: Serve with a smile
Prezi from scratch closely related to making a cake from scratch. You know the basic ingredients of a cake or the tools of Prezi. You visualize the end result and attempt to create your vision by mixing quantities of ingredients to achieve your goal. Sometimes you might not have everything the recipes calls for and have to make substitutions.
Scratch Cake Recipe
Step 1: Look for recipe in cookbook or online thinking about the overall outcome
Step 2: Check for all ingredients, if not, can substitute, check to see that you have all required photos you will need
Step 3: Add the ingredients one at a time always thinking about the visual representation, keeping the entire canvas in mind and adding the ingredients in the right order
Step 4: Mix well, rechecking all the ingredients, does it work, does it make sense
Step 5: Taste batter, does it taste right, do I need a little more or this ingredient or that ingredient? Do I need to make adjustments to color, fonts, and pictures?
Step 6: Bake cake and create path for the best outcome, making sure to keep a close eye on cooking time and pathways (they can be tricky ☺)
Step 7: Cool and recheck pathways and edit
Step 8: Optional: add icing and sprinkles
Step 9: Serve with a smile
Prezi from scratch was similar to my scratch cake. With this experience I wanted to concentrate on using one large illustration for the canvas, zooming in, out, and back and forth. In the video Where’s the “Learn This” Button?, Andersen (2011) is able to use the canvass exactly how I would have liked too. The task of finding one large illustration to represent the topic was very challenging and I was unable to find an image I was satisfied with. I substituted many photos for the large illustration.
As a new user to this Web 2.0 tool I enjoyed the learning curve that Prezi provided. Prezi has a very user friendly website. It was a great starting point for me. It offers many tutorials on how to start, make and enhance your personal Prezi. Like many other tools Prezi is only as dynamic as the creator. If the creator does not use the visual abilities of Prezi the presentation can easily fall into the category of being more or less like a slideshow, with words zooming in and out of frames.
Prezi is fighting for bragging rights in regards to presentation tools. I did not need to search too deep to come across articles that compare Prezi to Microsoft PowerPoint. While I was creating my Prezi, I too, could not help but compare this new tool to Microsoft PowerPoint. PowerPoint has dominated presentations for years and one might argue that it still does. Throughout the articles there are many benefits to both Prezi and PowerPoint. Each presentation tool has its benefits and depending on what you want your outcome to be, will depend on your choice of Prezi or another presentation tool. Barlow (2011) argues, “the most obvious initial benefit of using Prezi is that it is web-based” (p. 12). This in itself makes the use of collaboration very efficient and the presenter only needs to have an Internet connection to show off the presentation.
Positives for Prezi
•it is web-based
•various people can collaborate on the Prezi without email back and forth
•interesting visual canvas can be displayed
•makes the presenter and audience see/hear the presentation in a more visual way
•if the Prezi is made with a large image and no words, the presenter cannot just read the slides
•create your very own Prezi or use a template that is provided
•in control of the zooming, return to the same picture more that once
Negatives for Prezi
•the presenter must think in a new visual way (visual canvas with picture representation)
•limited number of fonts, styles, and colors to choose from
•can become time consuming as any new tool is before mastery
•cannot physically hand out the slides for audience to take notes
•if your presentation is only an illustration with no words it has to be presented or voice needs to be added
Classroom Use
Hargis and Yee (2010), reports that “Prezi represents the first step toward other visual tools that are not, strictly speaking, and presentations at all, but may yet find uses in classrooms” (p. 10). As a teacher Prezi is a welcomed change to presentations. One way that I would like to develop in the use of Prezis is by using the canvas as a visual representation for the concept I am teaching. This task would be time consuming and challenging, as designing pictorial representation is a huge challenge for myself. At first, I would spend too much time on thinking about the picture and I would get nothing accomplished. As a concluding unit project I would challenge the class by having them develop the picture and present it in a Prezi presentation, showing all the connections and learning they did throughout the unit.
I would also like to see my students learn how to use this tool. Presently I feel my students are very talented in making PowerPoint slideshows. Creating their Prezi would be a challenge, especially guiding them into using more pictures than words. I can also see Prezi being used to improve presentation skills, if students were only allowed to add pictures into the Prezi they would be forced to develop their oral presentation skills, as they could not just read the slides. Because Prezi is web-based it is also very easy to add a link to an e-portfolio that our school is currently trying to implement.
Evidence of Learning
Scientific Method (box cake)
