Exploring Prezi

I had heard occasional references to the presentation tool called Prezi, but I never saw an example until a recent visit to a site with suggestions for creating book trailers. The presentation by Michelle Harclerode swooped around from point to point explaining the steps of creating a book trailer.

I decided to try Prezi when preparing to speak briefly at our beginning of the year staff meeting. I wanted something visual to reinforce my words. Prezi had the added advantage of capturing our teachers' attention.

So what is Prezi?
This online presentation-builder allows users to create a canvas with whatever text and images are desired. During a presentation, users can click on various elements to zoom in and focus on those details. Or users can create a specific path that takes them from element to element on the canvas.  Their getting started tutorial explains the basics fairly well.

What I've learned about using Prezi

• Start with your big ideas and spread them around the canvas. Then add details to those main ideas.
• Practice with just text to start. Then add pictures to create visual interest.
• If you want a group of objects (text and/or images) to be seen at the same time, use a frame to group them.
• Be careful with how much zooming and movement you use: The right amount creates interest, but too much creates motion-sickness.
• Once your text and images are in place, set up just the first few steps of your path.  Then view the show to see how these elements appear.  You may realize that you want to change the grouping, size, or location of your elements.  If you like how the first few steps appear, continue to set the rest of your path.

My first Prezis:
Media Program comments: Talking points for beginning-of-the-year staff meeting.
Media Orientation: I used this Prezi the first time that classes came to check out books.  I used QuickTime to create a screencast, recording my voice as I clicked through the presentation.

Now you try!
I'd love to see your experiments with Prezi.  Share links in the comments.

Interacting with Electronic Text

As we get more and more information online, we need to be able to read and interact with electronic text more effectively.  Lately, I’ve been exploring two tools make that easier: Readability and Preview.

• Readability is a little application that pares web sites down to readable text without distracting graphics.*  That text can be saved as a PDF file which can be saved to a hard drive.
• Preview is a Mac application that allows us to annotate PDF files with highlighting and comments, etc.

Using Readability:



To save the text as a PDF, click on the printer button that appears on the left.  Instead of printing, though, click on the PDF button and Save as PDF.


Other ways to create PDFs:
Many educational web sites such as online encyclopedias and databases already have “Print” button that clears away clutter.  Three examples:

We can also copy text from a web site and paste it into a Pages document.  Then export the document as a PDF.


Interacting with PDFs using Preview:
We can open a PDF in Preview and then use the Annotation tools to highlight, comment, etc.

Potential uses:

• Teachers could comment on written assignments students turn in without having to print them out.
• Students could use a "talk to the text" strategy.
• Students could identify various kinds of words or phrases in a passage: proper nouns, similes, words they don't know, especially interesting words.
• While doing research, students could highlight the most important parts of the text before taking notes.

Share your ideas in the comments.  And let us know if you have a way of doing this with a PC.



*Is it just me, or is it ironic that we go to all this trouble to design attractive web pages and then cut out all those graphics to make them easier to read?