What I did at work today....

While I showed Holly, Jaclyn, and Catherine how to mess around with iMovie and Garageband.

The Scariest Podcast EVER

Professional Communication and Presentation Surveys!

Hey! My students are working hard on their presentations this month. As always, I torture them with surveys. There are only 8 this month--yay! Take a few minutes to give these students some valuable information as they prepare their presentations.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Y69FCJ7
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QX2MP6Q
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C5RWX9Z
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QYP3Q3Q
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/JYCMBWZ
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C3HPBTL
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C3LKLYY

Tweak Your Slides, the workshop part deux

Alright! Here it is, version 2.0 of my upcoming workshop on visual design principles for educators. I LOVE these slides. I mean, I think I am seriously in love with just how beautiful they are. I am deeply enamored by the "tight" and clean look of Helvetica Neue Condensed Black all caps at 72 pt. and above.

Yes, I did just enthusiastically proclaim love for a font style and weight. I am off to Body Pump now, but feedback is deeply and greatly appreciated. Let me know what you think!

Tweak Your Slides: Ten Design Principles for Educators (version 2.0)

View more presentations from Chiara Ojeda

Make it a Krispy Kreme Burger

So, no, I was not accepted to the University of Washington's doctoral teaching and curriculum program. Should I be more upset? Probably. Am I upset? Not really. Perhaps it's just getting to an age where I realize life is a constant ebb and flow of triumph and disappointment, and instead of frantically swimming against this certainty, I've decided to move and flow with it, releasing myself to the ecstasy of not really knowing where this current will take me.

Sometimes life is like this, a complex swirly of dirty laundry.
Or, maybe it's because I still have a decent paying job doing something I kick butt at (despite daily frustration and consternation), a healthy and happy family, fascinating and caring friends, and all of my appendages, organs, and body parts intact (oh, yeah, did I also mention I have a kick ass sense of style)? As my cousin heads off to help tsunami victims, leaving a wife and child behind, I can't help but realize that the reason I am not upset is both of the above but even more importantly, it is faith that all falls into a place and pattern in its own time.

But, the rest of the time it's a Krispy Kreme burger.
In honor of said release to aforementioned ebb and flow, I give you Neil Pasricha, of 1000 Awesome Things and his TED talk, The 3 A's of Awesome:


Look for another draft of the WIP Tweak Your Slides workshop this afternoon!

Tweak Your Slides, the workshop

Well, after a productive morning of grading, coffee seeking, and lake walking, I hunkered down and got back to work on the slides for my upcoming short presentation on visual design. I chose to use examples of my old slides as the representations of what NOT to do. I of course had an incredible bounty of amazingly BAD slide shows to choose from. It's a miracle my students didn't show up one day with pitchforks and torches clamoring for my head as a response to the crime of mass murder--I LOVED bullets. Sweet, sweet bullets, so easy to add to a slide, so completely irresistible in their "professional necessity". It's no wonder my first rule is do not use bullets.

Kill the Beast!

Some feedback on this would be super duper duper appreciated. Anyone who does respond gets some of these:

Tweak Your Slides, the workshop:

Tweakyourslides

View more presentations from Chiara Ojeda.

Jury Duty!

This post could also be titled, "What I am doing to avoid recognizing that I am sitting in a stark room full of strangers for eight hours." I had a mild heart attack the first time I receive a jury summons at the age of 22. It was not the thought of fulfilling my civic duty that created apprehension as much as it was the idea of being forced to decide the fate of someone who may or may not be guilty of a heinous crime. I believe I was also equally apprehensive about the thought of missing days of school and work, as I have always been quite the workaholic.

So, instead of subjecting myself to these various scenarios, I wrote a strongly worded letter explaining that missing even one class in a graduate program could significantly diminish my ability to successfully complete a course of study. Whoever read that was either deeply moved by my eloquence or just didn't really care much about who got out of jury duty. As long as he or she had made the effort to write a letter in the first place, why not let the concerned citizen (me in this case) get out of serving at this time. The second time I received a summons, I threw it away, believing that just feigning ignorance or claiming I'd moved would be enough to fend off possible repercussions....as far as I can tell, I was right.

When I received my third summons a month ago, I resisted for a moment, recalling previous fears, then just said, what the heck, might as well see what this whole civic duty thing is all about. After a mild panic session upon hearing a rumor that I could NOT bring my laptop, I did a bit of research and found out that while I am not allowed to bring a perfume bottle over 4 oz (that is a butt load btw...), I am allowed to indeed bring a laptop. And, so I sit and write this from a sterile room full of strangers, some sleeping, some working, a few playing Scrabble... one gentleman sternly told a repeated wrong number to please stop calling, then called his provider to block the number and would not tell the operator his social security number because he was, "in a very public place....the jury room actually..."

(What I secretly hope happens....)

I have been using my morning to work on the upcoming 20 minute slide design boot camp/overview I am presenting to the English department in a few weeks. After running a few ideas by friends, faculty, and students, I decided to structure the presentation around 10 dos and don'ts of slide design, focusing on the areas audiences often have the most complaints about and that educators can apply easily, without advanced knowledge or experience in Keynote or Power Point. Here is what I have come up with so far as a rough outline. Look for a first draft by the end of the day....that is, unless I get called up to serve on the trial of the century.


Title: Tweak your Slides! Ten Zen Design Principles for Educators

Do Not
Use bullets
Do Use Text Purposely

Do Not
Use templates
Do create your own

Do not
Use clip art
Do use images that are emphasize realism

Do not
Crowd your slides
Do provide visual breathing room

Do not
Confuse your viewer
Do use contrast to increase understanding

Do not
Use animations without purpose
Do use animation for a reason

Do not
Forget an extra slide costs nothing
Do use the medium to its best advantage

Do not
Confuse your audience
Do create a unified theme

Do not
Make your slides the focus
Do detach by reducing, recording, repeating

Do not
Use a visual medium to convey a textual idea
Do apply the picture superiority effect

Yeah, but when I say constraint, I don't mean myself....

Image courtesy of phobus via Flickr

Boss: Hey, so can you briefly talk to the department about Duarte's principles of visual design.

Me: Oooohh... Excited, how, what, yayy!! I just talked to someone in student development about presentations and students and yay and fun...

Boss: we need something very brief; just cover the major points...if you can do that.

Me: it 's not my fault; I've been conditioned to speak for at least 4 hours at a time :)

Boss: Just talk about why visuals are so important and choosing the right visual to accompany your thoughts. If you go over, I will play instrumental music.

Me: Sure, like for an hour? (I teach at Full Sail, an hour is nothing to me. NOTHING!!!)

Boss: I was thinking 20 minutes

Me: hahahaha.....haaaa...lol. Okay, let me breathe for a second.

Boss: I was going to ask if you were breathing. Think of it as a pecha kucha.

Me: Let's do this!