A500.9.4.RB - Course Reflections

When this class first started I thought from the title that it was going to be about researching journal articles, leadership and analyzing those articles. This class was more about setting up a base of what leadership is along with some research. The critical thinking in this course has helped me a lot to see the flaw that I had in my critical thinking. One of the most important aspects of this critical thinking, I thought was the fallacies. I thought I knew a lot about what a fallacy was but what I didn't understand was that there were so many different kinds of fallacies.

To improve on my experience in this class I think I could have spent more time building an outline. I think to improve on a lot of the mistakes I made an outline would have made all of my thought flow better and I would have gained a better insight to what I was trying to say. I thought that if I was able to just write whatever came to my mind that it would flow and it would come natural. But the contrary was true, I found myself having to go back and alter and shift my thoughts to get papers to flow better. 

The feedback and support for this class was second to none. I have been through a few college classes now and this class is at the top for feedback. I think that the discussions were great. If there wasn't enough information, questions were asked to get a conversation going. To get additional support for this class I think that a better understanding of APA format needs to be addressed. After a few assignments that needed APA format I had to look it up on Youtube to get a better understanding of what was required. I think that the Prude site is overrated, while it is worded well it is still hard to understand and I personally had to go outside of the site to understand more about APA format. I think that a lot of the topics in this course are relevant to everyday environment. There are a lot of real life applications in this course that need to be addressed for future leaders. I think that future courses will be easier now that I have a critical mind to attack the information provided and understand it more.

A500.8.3.RB - Good Presentation Design

A good presentation is not always what I have thought a good presentation should have been. A good presentation should have less. The way that I view presentations in the past has been to put the information that you are presenting in the presentation. The reality of this statement is that the opposite is true. The less you have in your presentation the better your presentation will be. That isn't to say that a presentation should be blank or have meaningless. The presentation needs to drive home the major point but also to do it in the most practical way.

I think that a good presentation should be all about symmetry,with the entire presentation flowing and everything working together. The audience can't get distracted by what is on the screen and stop listening, but also just listening to a presentation the audience can lose focus. One can do this through the use of proper slides that don't overwhelm the audience but still drive home the major point. I think that's where I have always gone overboard with the presentations. I always try to fit everything that I am saying onto the screen for everyone to read.   

One of the most interesting things that I learned about is clutter and empty space of a presentation. I have always tried to make empty space my presentation useful by filling it in with pictures or funny sayings, just something to fill that void. In reality empty space is just another tool to be used when you are trying to make clarity. There is a type of clarity that comes from having an open space presentation that you are more focused and not overwhelmed.

With this new view, I think that I can make better and more efficient presentations.  Now I know  that a presentation should have less in the slide and more of the single most important point. The picture in the presentation should correlate with what I am saying and that empty space is a tool to be used for focus.