Connecting the Wires

At the risk of sounding like a horrible student - I must confess I did not expect to glean much from the group presentation. Much to the contrary, I find that I've learned a great deal about the topic itself, as well as the construction of the presentation.

Firstly, there was a surprising amount of information to be found on the topic. My group chose to take a stab at the controversy of integrating technology in classroom, and how critical it is (or isn't). Beyond the obvious and general statements, there was a large number of statistics available to us that drove home the point that technology is very important for future employment opportunities. Mirroring that with the epidemic-proportion rise in childhood & adolescent obesity... and you have one monstrous combination.
As essential as it is to teach the future generations to be able to competently function with the technology, it is equally important to for them to lead balanced and healthy lives.
We're not doing so well with that last part, you'll note.

Early on in the project, I volunteered to construct a Prezi as our main feature. My enthusiasm for the format has not changed, though like PowerPoint, I'm more than willing to point out certain flaws. Similar rules apply for a Prezi be effective - too much font will quickly become overwhelming - and too many special effects or flips will not only distract your audience, but possibly give them a headache.
That said, not enough detail or variation in the lettering, and you just get a boring presentation all over again.

If you plan on having a good Prezi, I suggest lots of practice and henceforth, lots of free time.

Post Script:

To follow up on an earlier post, my father has asked that I sit down and spend some time with him to work out a Prezi for a presentation he plans to do for his work. Hopefully the experience from doing this project will help me when we work on his own Prezi.

Short Circuit

The other day in one of my classes at the college, we encountered "technical difficulties". In the class previous, the bulb in the overhead projector blew out. 
This wouldn't be such an issue, things go wrong with equipment all the time. We just never seem prepared when it does.  
The unfortunate part of this is that our lectures are based off material that the professor has on the computer. Without the projector, the very design of his class was disrupted. 
A normal projector was available in the classroom, but as none of the notes were on transparency sheets, this was of no benefit to us. 
Several minutes were lost as our professor had to figure out what to do as a substitute for the lesson, and after going over only a few slides worth of material, he ended the class roughly 15 minutes early. 

This experience left me with a great feeling of dissatisfaction and disappointment with technology as a whole. We are so dependent on it; we've become crippled by it.
When something goes wrong with our computer, we feel helpless and isolated.
When other equipment malfunctions, we are rendered equally incapable of successfully finishing otherwise simple tasks.

I understand the importance of being able to function with technology, but I also firmly believe that more emphasis needs to be placed on other non-technological skills. Hand writing, for instance. As much of an asset as typing is, this skill should not come at the loss of legibility when using a pen and piece of paper.

Perhaps it's time to remember that for the many years prior to the rise of the computer, we were more than capable of doing everything manually. We can take notes from off the whiteboard, we can do mathematical calculations without a calculator at our fingertips, and we can write lengthy essays without having to type.

We just need to remember that, contrary to popular thought, we do not need the computer.