Great design is about a story

Prezi.com once again held a contest for classroom presentations. The results are encouraging – teachers are improving the way they present material to their classes. But it doesn't require special software or fancy zooms to improve your lecture slides. It simply requires an age old tactic of tapping into your students' emotions. The winner this year was a deeply philosophical lesson by Mr. Adam Griffin. He discusses the morality of choice in a way that any college student in Philosophy 101 will be familiar with, but he also uses a novel tactic to grab his students' attention. View it below:

MOST: Making difficult choices on Prezi

Great design is about a story

I commend Mr. Griffin for such a fabulous slideshow and recommend Prezi as a great tool for certain lessons. But the reason this presentation is so powerful has nothing to do with the tool that was used or the way it was designed. It has everything to do with the fact that it employed a compelling story. A similar result could have been achieved with PowerPoint, Keynote, OpenOffice, SlideRocket, a DVD player, or even a reel to reel projector!

Our brains are wired to pay attention to emotional stories, not bullet-points. They can be in the form of a movie clip, a radio segment, a joke, or even a compelling photograph. This is why students will fall asleep 20 minutes into a lecture, but stay awake and engaged through 3 hour movie.

So rather than beginning your lecture with a series of 'umms' and 'ahhs' whilst hooking up your laptop and projector, take a cue from great productions like Saturday Night Live and get everything ready ahead of time for a well-planned cold opening that will grab their attention and prime their minds for the lecture you will give.

See the rest of the contest winners at Prezi's blog: Prezi “Zoom Back to School” Contest – Winners Announced! - Prezi.com Blog.

Dance for your Ph.D. – Replacing PowerPoint with Dance

Not only am I passionate about improving the way presentations are delivered, but as a professional ballroom dancer by night, I also happen to be very passionate about dance. As you can imagine, it's not very often that those two passions meet up. Which is why I was ecstatic when I came across this fabulous TEDxBrussels talk about using dance instead of PowerPoint. John Bohannon – a.k.a. the Gonzo Scientist – is a biologist, writer, adventurer, and creator of the Dance Your Ph.D Contest. He masterfully demonstrated the technique of presentation via dance at the recent TEDxBrussels event as he shared the stage with 10 dancers from Minneapolis' Black Label Movement dance company. Watch the 11-minute presentation below.

While hiring a dance troupe for each presentation you give may be a little unrealistic, what I love about this innovative idea is that it contains all of the key ingredients or an effective presentation: engagement, novelty, repetition (albeit simultaneous repetition rather than sequential), and concision.

What other creative presentation methods could replace PowerPoint?

Video Episode 5: Designing Slides for Cognitive Load

Here's a real world example of a chart adapted to a slide and how some simple changes make the chart more readable and easier to understand.

This video is also available via a free subscription to the Brainslides Video Podcast in iTunes.

Video Episode 4: Improve Images with Alpha Selection

Images can be a great visual aid. But when you're using a black or gradient slide background and the image is surrounded by a white square it can look tacky. Here's how to use a tool in Keynote to selectively remove the background of an image to make it really fit the slide design.

This video is also available via a free subscription to the Brainslides Video Podcast in iTunes.