Prezi For Presentations: Goodbye PowerPoint!

PowerPoint has been around since I was a kid. I remember doing my first PowerPoint presentation when I was in 6th grade, way back in 1992. It wasn't a very user friendly experience, but it was definitely groundbreaking. Sadly, it's not as exciting anymore, or as the kids might say, it's "played out" (do kids still say that?)

Now my students use Prezi. I have signed up for an educator account, and my students build their Prezi's under my account name. It's a fantastic update to the PowerPoint model. As they build slides, they are given a linear view to the side, but they can manipulate the space that the slides are in, making them bigger, smaller, turning them at weird angles. As the slideshow progresses, it zooms and flips around. It can be a little unnerving if you have problems with fast moving things, but students just love it.

In my class, students use Prezi to make presentations based on books and characters in reading class, present research in social studies, and to present concepts in both math and science. It's a great tool, it's easy to teach, and the students love it. Try it out!

I've included a Prezi here for you to see. This one was made by my son this past year while he was in 4th grade. He did this without me showing him anything but the absolute basics: