PowerPoint

After reading the article on PowerPoint, I must say that I agree with each of their statements. When I think about it, I have seen very few well done PowerPoint presentations. Most of the time, people get up there and present the presentation by staring at the screen the entire time. This is extremely frustrating for viewers.
5 Guidelines I fine important:
1. Make eye contact with the audience: It is very annoying when students and teachers stare at the screen the entire presentation and read it word for word. Instead, they should glance every now and then and present thoughts from their notes and from their brain.
2. Do not fill up the screen with text: No one wants to look at a screen with all writing on it. It is hard on the eyes and is plain annoying.
3. Be careful with colors: Sometimes people get out of hand and go crazy with color on their presentations. Too much color is often an annoyance for viewers.
4. Do not use clip art: Clip art is very childish. Instead, people should use real pictures and photographs from the real world. People can relate more with these images than with computer animated ones.
5. Show energy: By showing excitement and energy in one's tone, the presentation has potential to be entertaining and viewers will pay attention. Most presenters read directly from the screen and the result is a horribly boring presentation.

CLT

The center for learning and technology, also known as the AT&T room, is an incredibly helpful area located on the first floor of Coates Library. This room is equipped with the latest technology with a large supply of Macs and PCs spread out everywhere. There is also a lab room that has both Macs and PCs along with a giant projector screen and a smart board that is perfect for presentations. There is also a classroom that students can reserve for group studying, This room comes with a 60 inch plasma TV that can be used to video chat with others around the globe. One thing that I may take advantage of is the scanning. There are a massive amount of scanners and copiers in this room along with printers. This could be great for class assignments. The best part, however, is that there are always people ready to help you with your needs. I am not the brightest person when dealing with technology so I feel that this will greatly benefit me. One of the coolest things about this place is that they have a recording studio area inside the lab room. This could be great for future class projects dealing with music.

Excel

After these past few weeks of hands on experience with Excel, I feel that I am much better at using the tools that Excel has to offer. The absolute and relative cell references are extremely helpful to know how to use when dealing with tables and formulas. Also, the formulas such as SUM, AVG, etc. are extremely easy to deal with a large amount of numbers when dealing with totals. I also feel that I am much stronger at producing a much more appealing chart or table with the use of themes. I feel that I may be using Excel often in business classes and when dealing with many numbers, so by learning how to use Excel will obviously benefit me greatly. Even after college, if and when I am in the business world, Excel will be a valuable knowledge to know and understand how to use and navigate.

Chris Nolan

Chris Nolan's presentation in class on Thursday really proved to be enlightening. I learned a great amount about Google that I did not know before. I was surprised that Google constitutes for about ninety percent of search engines on the Internet. That is a massive amount for one search engine. I thought that, at most, Google would make up for fifty percent of search engines because other, such as Yahoo and Msn are extremely popular also. Well apparently they are not if Google really does account for that massive percentage. I also learned about Google's search methods. When we type something into the search engine, Google matches our search with sites that are popular and Google monitors how sites are linked to one another with regards to popularity. I have always wanted to know what "I'm feeling lucky" means and Chris Nolan informed us. When one searches for a subject and clicks on the "I'm feeling lucky" button, Google automatically connects you to a popular cite for that subject. I feel that this will come in handy later on for my searches and am glad that I learned about it. Chris Nolan also spoke to us about selecting quality websites. For example, when browsing a site online, it is always important to click on the link that says, "about this site" in order to find out about the credibility of that website. All in all Chris Nolan provided new and insightful information that I will take in and hopefully implement for now on.

Pictures That Lie

I chose the picture of the US army helicopter flying right above the ocean. There is a man hanging on a rope ladder on the side of the chopper and in the real picture, he is trying to climb up. In the fake picture, however, there is a giant shark jumping out of the water towards the man. I chose this picture because it is extremely exciting to look at at see the massive shark about to attack this man. This image made its way on in Internet in 2001. The man in the picture was adjusted so he is now facing to the right, and the shark was pasted in so that it looks like it is jumping at the man. This picture was obviously manipulated to appear much more dramatic than it was in the first place. I think that it is harmful in a small way since, it were real, the man could possibly have been killed. I also, however, find it visually appealing and interesting. This was a clever piece of work.