Free Webinar Series: Improve Your PowerPoint Presentations

Ellen Finkelstein is hosting a free webinar series--learn how to eliminate Death by PowerPoint and make your presentations come to life. Listen to guest experts share their best techniques and answer your questions!

There will be seven sessions on Wednesdays at 11am PT/2pm ET beginning today, September 6, 2011 and running through October 26^th (no session on September 21^st). Each webinar lasts 1 hour but may run over slightly. Each webinar will be recorded so you can view it later (up to 2 weeks after the session). Register for the webinars now! You must register, even to view the recordings.

Each week, you'll hear from an amazing lineup of guest speakers who will reveal their secrets and strategies on presenting and speaking effectively. Visit the PowerPoint blog to see the list of speakers. Or visit the OutstandingPresentationsWorkshops.com website. 

Register here.

Game Based Learning - An Introduction

During this webinar, Patrick will be introducing the concept of Game-based Learning, explain how it can be employed in instructional settings, and provide practical information on how to harness this engaging medium.
This is the first in a planned series of webinars from partners, MissionV Education Limited, a not for profit organisation specialising in the use of virtual worlds technology for the support of primary and post primary students and iGBL (Game -Based Learning Research Group) based in Waterford Institute of Technology.
iGBL organised a highly successful Symposium on Game-Based Learning (GBL) in Waterford Institute of Technology in May 2011.  This symposium brought together teachers, lecturers, students and researchers, and provided insights from different perspectives such as educational psychology, sociology, Human Computer Interaction (HCI), Artificial Intelligence, Game Design, or Instructional Design.

Effective Webinars: Some Tips

A webinar allows a presenter or a group to conduct live presentations over the Internet via a web-conferencing software such as Adobe Connect or Blackboard Collaborate (Elluminate). Webinars can include many features, but generally include a series of PowerPoint slides. The audience members can ask questions and often interact in the chat window provided. Audio is usually received via phone lines or through the computer speakers. Webinars are often recorded and can be accessed later for just-in-time viewing and review. Although Webinars may not be as effective as a face-to-face session, with today's economic climate, they allow organizations to save time and money while still meeting the needs of their faculty.

I just found this blog post by Maria Anderson in which she references an article she wrote for eLearn Magazine called Tips for Effective Webinars.  She goes through a “Before, During, and After” set of tips for giving a good, effective, and engaging webinar. Unfortunately, because the article has been archived, many of the examples and images did not come through. The suggestions, however, are very helpful.

Here’s topics list for the tips that appear in the article:

• Recording and distribution
• Presentation design
• Engage often
• Animation
• Hyperlinks
• Video clips
• Trial run
• Arrive early
• Clear directions
• Desktop sharing
• Webcam sharing
• The echo
• After the Webinar

Additional related articles:

How to Give a Webinar (and Not Look Like an Idiot)

What makes a webinar great? — a Q-and-A with Ann Handley

The Webinar Blog: Tips

5 Surefire Tips For Running An Effective And Engaging Webinar