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So my choice for presentation materials in the large class is I do choose
to use PowerPoint. My goal with the PowerPoint though is to make it
mostly question-based. Now it’s a human anatomy class, so the
content is visual. So, it obviously begs visuals to come into play there,
but what I try really hard to do is to consider that text on the screen ideally
shows up as either a question or after the students have answered the
question, so that they just have the visual clarification. So that’s the goal
behind the presentation materials is to bring the visuals on board, give
students a chance by asking a question. For example, I might have some
anatomy up there and have an arrow pointing to a piece of the anatomy
and say, “Can someone tell me what this is called?” I get an answer
shouted out. “What’s the function of that?” An answer is shouted out.
So it’s that type of fluid back and forth between teacher and student
dialogue and the reason that that can happen is that the students
came to the table with their own content already. But the nice thing
about that is then is a student beside them can say, “Oh gosh, I
thought that that was this. Now I’d better go look back at my External
Brain and make a little change or...” So that’s sort of the way I see the
classroom dynamic working, students have the content, I’m prompting
them to assess really together if their content is correct; if they
understand the application; did they understand the function? And
sometimes I’ll bring in new content that they haven’t had a chance to
think about before, but that should be built on top of what they’ve already
learned so that it’s a smooth, you know, transition from content they
brought with them to content that’s being added in the moment. So
that’s the basic technique that I use. And then embedded throughout
the PowerPoint at various times are clicker questions, so the students
have all purchased a clicker at the bookstore, they all have it with them
each time, and they’re registered to their name, so I know who’s clicking
what. But the goal there is to give them a chance to truly take a step
forward and say, “This is what the answer is.” And that’s been a very
successful tool as well in this large classroom environment. I don’t actually
care if they click the right answer or the wrong answer, I just want them to
be checking with themselves, making a choice, you know, seeing, you
know, would they be able to handle that exam question right now, today,
with the knowledge they’ve built. So, I let them discuss before, I’ll put
up a clicker question then and the room gets really loud, people talk with
their neighbors, and then they select and answer, and then it gives them
a chance, really, for them to see and me to see, you know, are we on the
same page here. So, I’ve really enjoyed that, you know, I’ll just display the
results up there right away and if it’s ninety percent of the people are on
the same page then we usually spend very little time and move right on,
whereas when there is a lot of dichotomy in the answers then we’ll stop
and say, “Okay, let’s talk about someone who chose A, tell me why you
chose A.” You know, so the students have a chance to say, “Well, this is
why I thought it was A and this is why I thought it was C.” So we have a
chance to really break it down.
And I like it because it’s an authentic exam style. I really don’t think it’s
fair for students to have their first chance at seeing the format of how
you’re going to ask them how to access their knowledge on the day of
the exam. I think it’s a lot better if you can give them chances along the
way to be assessing their knowledge all the time. And so, you know,
so if you take that then as a big presentation style, I would say that, you
know, there is a PowerPoint going the whole hour and twenty minutes
of class, but that’s interrupted between visuals, with questions, with
you know, student responses, with clicker questions, and sometimes
just group activities where I’ll say, “Okay, you know, here's a scenario.
What would you do? What is the application?” And let them talk for two
or three minutes in their groups themselves. So, all of those are kind
of inter-mixed into a presentation style.