Three interesting presentations
Sunday, August 19, 2007 at 09:46AM As part of my research on Partnership Learning I've been watching videos from the TED website, which I personally consider a fantastic place to get new ideas, and to simply be inspired to be more creative. In fact, at the upcoming 2nd Annual Instructional Coaching Conference we're going to do a little TED-type presenting of our own, with what I refer to as Lightning Round, 7 short presentations (8 minutes each) by experts in coaching, and then we'll be uploading those presentations, as well as other interesting videos to the Instructional Coaching Website.
While reviewing the TED videos I found three that are particularly interesting, to me at least, both for their content and for the way in which they deliver the content. First, Seth Godin's presentation on the spread of ideas (an idea I explore in my book Instructional Coaching ) shows that PowerPoint or Keynote slides can be great allies for presentations if they contain more images and fewer words. Second, Richard St. John's talk on the secrets of success shows that you can present a lot of information, quickly and effectively if you use a tight organizational structure. Finally, Peter Gabriel's talk on the witness program communicates the potential of video to promote worldwide awareness and learning.
The most important important message here, I suppose, is that if you've got something worthwhile to say, people will listen. Each of these presentations excites, inspires, and moves us to action, and that is a lot to accomplish in a brief presentation.
