Rules of thumb for amount of content

[Kevin]

I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time (i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines one should follow?

 

[Austin Myers]

Kevin,

There really isn't a hard and fast rule due to the variation in your
audience. (A group of kids have a much shorter attention span as an
example.) However with that said, I approach building a presentation with
one thought in mind, "What is the main point I want to convey"? Everything
else should be supportive of that main idea.

Next, I go by the old school saying of "tell it three times".

Tell them what you are going to explain.
Explain it.
Then tell them what you just explained.


And finally, the presentation is nothing more than a tool, *YOU* are the
presenter. Do not make the mistake of using PPT as a crutch for a poor
presentation. (I see this everyday and it's saddening.)


Austin Myers
MS PowerPoint MVP Team

Solutions to Multimedia in PowerPoint www.pfcmedia.com


I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount
of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time
(i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep
things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines
one should follow?

 

[tosime]

Kevin,

This is a great question to ask and a tough one to answer. Audiences and content differ so much that I wonder if basic rules can apply.

Consider audience: a) Receptive v non-receptive
b) Knowledgeable v ignorant (on the subject matter)
c) Biased v non biased
Consider content: a) Simple v Complex
b) Narrow v broad
Consider time: a) Variable & extensive v fixed and & short
Consider environment, other speakers, other resources, design skills, audience participation etc.

These variables interact and influence content density.

My suggestions are: Prepare one or two levels deeper than you plan to deliver to give you flexibility during your presentation. Include handouts with more detail in other formats i.e. text, symbols, numeric etc. Be ready with a summary for each section in case you have to end abruptly due to time constraints or other reasons. Include unusual content where the audience has to do a double take - that moment of adjustment stimulates learning. Follow the audience reaction.

Hope that helps...Tony
I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time (i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines one should follow?

 

[TAJ Simmons]

Kevin,

Sometimes a one or two word slide has a greater impact that a bullet list with many points.

Further reading....
http://www.beyondbullets.com/

Cheers
TAJ Simmons
microsoft powerpoint mvp

awesome - powerpoint backgrounds,
http://www.powerpointbackgrounds.com
free powerpoint templates, tutorials, hints and tips etc

I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time (i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines one should follow?

 

[Guest]

I absolutely agree with all of the above messages about how the number of
slides
and amount of content depends on your aduience and what you are trying to
accomplish.
Nevertheless, I think that these replies avoided answering in any concrete
sense.
So I will attempt to say how much I aim for in a particular situation.

I teach finance to MBA students. Lectures are typically either 50 minutes or
3 hours long. From the time I was writing on transparencies my rule of thumb
(much violated) has always been: "No more than 8 slides per hour." This
would be with 6-8 points per slide. If I'm lazy, I find that I do much more
than this. The idea is that the slides give me the topics that I'm going to
talk about in class, as well as an occasional graph, set of equations, and
backup material (that I don't really plan to use - not included in the 8 per
hour).
Long extended problems - e.g. a table with a capital budgeting problem on
it - might be very dense with info - but should take 10-20 minutes to go
over. I had a teacher who would aften ask "What's the third number down in
the 5th column mean?" His point was that if you don't have anything to say
about that number, or at least if you can't answer that question in an
interesting manner - then that number should not be included.
I like the response about having 2 or 3 levels of back-up material.
PowerPoint lets
you be very flexible in lectures - very spontaneous, yet well prepared! You
can do extra examples, have preview or summary slides ready that you never
expect to use. Mathematical proofs are almost never used - but the method
that I was educated in demands that I have these available if needed.
So what am I now doing in PowerPoint? Actually sometimes it seems that I
go into a 3 hour lecture with about 90 slides ready and linked together. But
the key is that I don't really expect to use 75% of these, which -
surprisingly enough - means that I'm using about 7.5 slides per hour.
I don't recommend this for everybody of course - but I think that
everybody gets
comfortable with theire own pace and density of material.

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

I think you've really answered your own questions. There is no such thing
as a rule of thumb for good teaching, and as you have hinted at in the
post, this isn't really a PowerPoint question but a teaching question. As
you know, showing lots of extraneous garbage just so you can say that you
have "covered the material" is bad teaching, whether you do it with
PowerPoint, overhead slides, a chalk board, or ... Rather than exploring
slide density, you might explore other methods of teaching, such as
problem-based learning, case studies, student-centered learning, etc.
--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.loyola.edu/education/PowerfulPowerPoint/

 

[Tony Osime]

Hello Kevin,

Based on the answers you have received what are your thoughts?

....Tony
I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time (i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines one should follow?

 

[Guest]

I'm sorry. I got confused about who was asking and who was answering. I
thought that the original poster had chimed back in with some more insight.
As it turns out, pdek (whom I mistook for the original poster) provided some
great insights. I thought that the original questioner, in an attempt to
clarify his question, provided his own answer. Actually, it was pdek who, in
an attempt to answer the question, actually answered the question.
--David

 

[Kevin]

All,

I had good chuckle reading David's second post. I really appreciate all of your insights here.

One thing that is becoming increasingly clear is that many people (perhaps everyone) who uses PowerPoint is faced with this dilemma of "what content will I present, and why?" and "how much is too much?"

Just as Austin stated, staying focused on the main point -- the essential message I am trying to convey -- is something I try to always remember. Saying it three times has also been an effective strategy for reinforcing key concepts.

I also like the idea of creating a summary of each section, in the event that one's timing is thrown off by the inevitable.

I will also work to remove irrelevant words and other 'junk' from my slides to assist learners in remembering the content. I recognize the value of thought provoking slides -- slides that serve as in-depth talking/discussion points. Replacing mundane text bullets with visual representations of concepts can often be very effective.

Thanks all for your discussion.

--
Kevin

Hello Kevin,

Based on the answers you have received what are your thoughts?

...Tony
I'm curious if anyone has some best practices recommendations for the amount of content (or ideas) that should be covered in a certain duration of time (i.e. how many slides per minute for best retention -- to aid learning).

I follow the Rule of Six to limit the amount of content, and do try to keep things as brief and visual as possible. But are there any other guidelines one should follow?