So they’ve identified the problem. But how do you fix the problem while tip-toeing around the egos of accomplished researchers and educators. And frankly the problem extends to student presentations and beyond the classroom to conferences and business meetings. The technology does make the abuse of poorly designed visual aids more rampant than before, but mostly because people were often too lazy to prepare overheads before the widespread possibilities of Powerpoint.

And the article hits the flip side of the argument dead on. When you have a professor who uses overheads, all the students start grumbling about tuition costs and they thought this is the digital age.

And this is a great resource…classic really. A webpage about making the most out of a Powerpoint presentation while using eye-glazing-over web design tactics of small text, wide screen, no visuals. Apparently they understand Powerpoint, but not the Internet. So screw it. Just get Edward Tufte’s The Cognitive Style of Powerpoint.

And for god’s sake…stop reading from your slides!!!!

I should write more about instructional technology on my instructional technology blog. I am inspired by a post at Digital Medievalist which makes me want to spread my own soundbyte about instructional technology. Digital evangelist administrators and educators are confused. They are so blind to the creeping hegemony and borderline fascism of our digital society that they want to replicate it over and over again, promulgating dutiful digital consumers in their classrooms. (Maybe they don’t really want this, but the cultural implications of their policies clearly will lead to this).

The promise of the introduction of new technologies is that they will fracture the traditional power dynamics of the classroom. Again, not how people usually phrase this. But often, classroom computer use and a constructivist philosophy are intertwined together as if one must lead to the other. In fact, more often teachers use computers in classrooms as rewards, as drilling machines, etc, only realizing the behavioristic potential of this equipment. Which is another case of business as usual in education.

The fact is that if you want to radically transform education, computers are not the technology you are seeking. A revised and empowering pedagogy is.