Virtual Presentations: Advantages and a Look at Prezi

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By Sophie Molaison

            The Internet is becoming so popular that businesses, educators, and students are becoming more technologically inclined to use the World Wide Web for their presentation needs. To learn in a new way may be difficult for some, but for others the resources the Internet has given us are more beneficial. Virtual presentations are used to inform, demonstrate, or persuade the audience of the content in the presentation. Internet presentation sites such as Prezi.com can be useful for all types of wanting to effectively inform an audience in a technological way.

To effectively communicate through an online presentation the presenter must be willing to take a few things into consideration: the importance of learning, the different ways people learn, and that success is not determined by learning style. (Novak & Gowin, 1985) Because learning is varied in many ways, online presentations allow diversity in learning. Learning techniques are important to know so that you can effectively communicate with your audience. To learn, a person must possess three things: Material to be learned must be conceptually clear and presented with language and examples relatable to the learner’s prior knowledge, the learner must possess relevant prior knowledge, and the learner must choose to learn meaningfully. (Ausubel, 1960)

For you to decide if online presentations are wonderful, terrible, or build an opinion, you have to know what they are. Virtual presentations include technology, video recording, voice, and in different environments. (King, 2013) A presenter is able to communicate with an audience without physically being with them. This means that the convenience factor is highly liked by viewers and presenters. Yes, online presentations can be a pain to put together. Yes, there are problems with technology. But, all of the good attributes may outweigh the bad. Here are the benefits of using online presentations.

1.     People viewing your presentation will see exactly what you've created. You avoid problems of reproducing colors, patterns, and images on printers.

2.     Once you've created a presentation, you can use it immediately, without waiting for it to be processed.

3.     Virtual presentations are more accessible and interesting to watch.

4.     You are able to create more interesting presentations, providing: advanced art lines, graphics, and 3-D effects.

5.     Easy distribution of the presentation via printout or PDF file.

6.     Virtual presentations can allow the same communication opportunity with people who may not be able to attend.

These advantages have become more apparent to my peers and I as students. Online presentations in the academic world are nearing requirement for all presentations because professors are also becoming more technologically dependent. This could be good or bad because people are beginning to expect virtual presentations more than an original, old-style presentation; many people are turning their heads towards fairly new Internet software called “Prezi.” The software is a cloud-based presentation and story-telling tool created on a blank, white canvas. Users are able to zoom-in and out of specific clouds to navigate through the presentation.  Prezi was created to get past the flat, old organization of PowerPoint. You may be accustomed to using PowerPoint, and that’s okay. But you learn new things everyday, right? Prezi is being introduced to the modern world for many reasons. Prezi.com is helpful in the learning process.

To learn by using Prezi, you have to know a little about using how to use the software. Basically to get started in Prezi you sign up for a free account on their web site, logon, click on the “my” [account] tab at the top of their screen, and select “Create a new Prezi” orange colored link on the left panel. Next you title your presentation, choose a style, and press the create button. That’s all there is to it. Then you are presented with a “canvas” into which you can click and drag [mouse around] navigation features of the Prezi software. In the upper left hand portion of your screen there is series of small blue circles that contains the navigation/editing menu. Using these circles you can add text; place, position, and zoom objects; add pictures, sound and video; frame presentations [similar to PowerPoint screen templates]; draw lines between concepts [connect the dots]; specify the animation order of your Prezi; preview what you have created; and finally save the Prezi to workspace on the web.

The free Prezi account gives you 100MB of storage, while the other for fee plans allows for additional online storage space and offline desktop use of the software. To show your presentation using the free account you must log on to Prezi via the Internet. This is not a particular burden since in most cases you will have Internet access for presentations at most venues, however the for fee plan does allow you to store Prezi files on a your local hard drive.  Although it may take you a small amount of time to catch on, it could be worth preparing better presentations in the future.

Now that you know more about online presentations and how beneficial they can be to the learning process, I am hopeful that you will begin to develop new strategies in presenting, including Prezi. I also hope that the steps that I have listed to begin working more with Prezi are useful to you in your presenting endeavors. I am confident that you will succeed in presenting your material in a professional, fun way instead of the old, Power Point way.  

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Sources

Novak, J. D., & Gowin, D. B. (1985). Learning how to learn. NewYork, NY: Cambridge University. Press.

 Ausubel D.P. (1960) The use of advance organizers in the learning and retention of meaningful verbal material. Journal of Educational Psychology 51, 267–272.