Using PowerPoint

Sean Hall, EMT-P

Published in the Winter 2006 issue of the Maine EMS I/C News

I teach using power point as an attention getter to help break up the class. The adult learner, as we all know, has an attention span similar to that of a young child in the classroom setting. Having the sights and sounds of PowerPoint, coupled with the old faithful chalk or white board and pre-printed handouts, just adds to the excitement level in the classroom.

I use PowerPoint, but should it not work, I still have my lesson plan notes used to build the PowerPoint, the class has the outline, and I always try to keep a bag of candy to throw or pass out to encourage and reward class interaction.

PowerPoint helps us all get through the thrills of A&P, but one must always be ready for the techno glitch. I guess my point is that it is a wonderful tool to help bring some life into parts of a class that usually cause the students to use toothpicks to hold their eyes open (you should see the reactions when you hand the toothpicks out!) Power point as just one part of teaching a class allows instructor flexibility, but should something go wrong with equipment, make sure you still have a fall-back plan.

I hated creating more paper for students by making handouts of all the slides, so my solution was this: I published the lecture on the web in a PDF format for them to download. Some did want the handouts of the slides, though, so I printed them off such that they could take notes as well. They did not have to buy notebook paper. There were others for whom I would burn a CD in PDF format using the notebook style.

I teach the medical emergencies section for a Paramedic class and I do make my own slides. I combine information from the book, the national outline and MEMS Protocol. I feel this gives the student a better base.

I also put the national outline on the web for them, burn a CD, or, for some, print off a copy as well.

The one thing we as instructors have to be aware of is that not everyone has or wants access to a computer or the web. There are times I can understand this, which is why I believe we can never leave our roots of just good old fashioned attention-getting lecture skills and the chalk or white board.