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Re: Appropriate technology; was: Scanning problems

-----Original Message-----
From: Leigh Palmer [mailto:palmer@SFU.CA]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 10:25 AM
To: PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu
Subject: Re: Scanning problems



Physicists very infrequently use Powerpoint. In the last two
years I've seen only one Powerpoint talk given by a physicist
who used it to show video clips. The talk was not very good, and
he ran it from his PowerBook. There were also floodlights set up
for videotaping the talk, and the technical peripheranalia were
so distracting that I got very little of the content he intended
to convey (which was pedagogy rather than physics). I have seen
business types use Powerpoint this way too, but the visuals were
never very necessary, and their static nature would have suited
them well to prepared transparencies.

While I agree that a great chalk & talk presentation can be as inspiring
as anything else, don't judge PowerPoint by the inept was business types
use it. Astronomers are starting to use it more at conferences I attend,
and some use it well. PowerPoint97+ is a much more dynamic and powerful
tool than Bill Gates & company realise - it just depends how you use it.

If you are interested in some examples, see on our page
http://www.swin.edu.au/astronomy/sao/content.html
two of our 'Activities" ('Destination Mars', and 'Learning about Stars
from their Spectra') from our introductory-level astro. courses. Note
that you can do much more advanced stuff this way too (and we have). I
did a whole slab of material on analog electronics this way a couple of
years ago, diagrams & maths included. (And students love it.)

Cheers
Margaret


--
Dr. Margaret Mazzolini
Astronomy Course Coordinator
Swinburne Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing
BSEE, Mail Box 31,
Swinburne University of Technology,
PO Box 214 Hawthorn VIC 3122
Australia
email: mmazzolini@swin.edu.au
phone: (+61) 3 9214 8084
fax: (+61) 3 9819 0856

Visit Swinburne Astronomy Online, online courses in astronomy:
http://www.swin.edu.au/astronomy/