Week 9

Assignments and activities for Week 9

Date

Class Meeting

For Next Class
Mon, 3/3

monthly #6

establish speaking order for project 2 presentations-- volunteer &/or draw for spaces [actual presentations will occur after spring break, probably Mon, 3/17-Fri, 3/21] 

peer-review of white papers (first drafts)

read ch 16 and Edward Tufte's Wired article, "PowerPoint is Evil."

Also interesting/amusing:

Wed, 3/5

Presentations-- questions for discussion

  • General
    • How important are presentations in your major or field?
    • What types do you foresee giving?
    • What sorts of visual aids are commonly used by your professors/ bosses?
  • PowerPoint:
    • what aspects of PP do you like? what aspects do you dislike?
    • what misuses of the program have you seen?
    • what effective uses of it have you seen?
    • what are Tufte's main complaints about the program? To what extent (if at all) do you agree with him?

mock presentation activity (part 1)

presentation outlines (for project 2) due

Fri, 3/7

mock presentation activity (part 2)

presentation outlines due for peer-review

  • peer-review sheet
work on project 2, especially the presentations

SPRING BREAK: March 10-15

Mock Presentation Activity

(Thanks to AJF in my fall class for suggesting this idea)

Overview/ Introduction: The Purdue Office of the Dean of Students has announced that it will award $10,000 in grant funding to 1-2 student teams with the best proposal to improve the university. Since these are internal grants, the competition won't be too stiff, but the senior staff in the ODOS [i.e. you, the class] would still like to see a one-page written proposal, a preliminary budget, and a 5 minute presentation of your idea.

Procedure:

  1. Form four 4-person teams. (In the case of perfect attendance, one group will have an extra person).
  2. On Wed, 3/5, spend 20 min brainstorming ideas to improve Purdue and choose one.
  3. After or at the end of class Wednesday, write up a brief proposal, budget, and a presentation outline or script. Before leaving class, you will need to delegate responsibility for writing the proposal, sketching out a budget, writing a presentation outline or script, and giving the presentation.
  4. Proposals will be due at 8:35 on Fri, 3/7. Presentations will be given in class on Friday.
  5. After all presentations are given, the "Dean's staff" will review them and vote on one or two to be funded.

(There will be a modest real-life prize for the winning group(s))