Why Your Students Forgot Everything On Your PowerPoint Slides

Why Your Students Forgot Everything On Your PowerPoint Slides(slīd)

By Mary(ˈmerē) Jo Madda

Don’t fret(fret), we’ve all been there: You’re up late the night before Thursday and you have to teach a lesson at 8 AM the next day. So, what do you do? Throw(THrō) some text on a PowerPoint and get ready to talk through your points. Couldn’t hurt, right? You might not always read straight(strāt) off of the slides—they’ll just help keep your lecture(ˈlekCHər) on track, and if you lose your place, the text is right there for you.

Unfortunately(ˌənˈfôrCHənətlē), whether you’re discussing Columbus(kəˈləmbəs) with 4th graders(ˈgrādər) or quantum(ˈkwäntəm) physics(ˈfiziks) with college freshmen, you may be hurting your students’ learning more than helping them.

Let’s explore(ikˈsplôr) why instructional design doesn’t typically work with students, or anyone’s learning for that matter, when you teach with PowerPoint—as well as how you can avoid it. It all begins with a little concept(ˈkänˌsept) called “cognitive(ˈkäɡnədiv) load.”

Too Much for the Student to Process

Imagine your student’s brain(brān) as a container. When you start tossing(täs,tôs) rocks into the container, it gets heavier(ˈhevē) and heavier—and more difficult for the student to carry(ˈkarē) or sort through(THro͞o). Essentially, that’s cognitive load. Cognitive load describes the capacity(kəˈpasədē) of our brain’s working memory (or WM) to hold and process new pieces(pēs) of information. We’ve all got a limited amount of working memory, so when we have to handle information in more than one way, our load gets heavier, and progressively(prəˈɡresivlē, prōˈɡresivlē) more challenging to manage.

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https://www.edsurge.com/news/2015-01-19-why-your-students-forgot-everything-on-your-powerpoint-slides