This is Your Brain on PowerPoint

From Information Aesthetics...
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Research at the University of NSW in Sydney, Australia claims the human brain processes and retains more information if it is digested in either verbal or written form, but not both at the same time. More of the passages would be understood & retained if heard or read separately.

"The use of the PowerPoint presentation has been a disaster," Professor Sweller said. "It should be ditched."

"It is effective to speak to a diagram, because it presents information in a different form. But it is not effective to speak the same words that are written, because it is putting too much load on the mind & decreases your ability to understand what is being presented."
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Meeting Suckification Reduction Devices:

• Don't put your speech verbatim as text on your PPT slides.
  
• Use charts, graphics, photos, and relate your spoken words to the images.
  
• Use picture book storytelling techniques -- have the narrative complement the illustrations.
  
• Think of it as reading a bedtime story to a youngster...
  You read the text and show the pretty pictures.