Prezi, a Flash-based tool for “zooming” presentations, has been divisive among academics since it was first introduced in 2009. The platform has come a long way over the years--when I first used it for my dissertation defense visuals in 2010, it was impossible to do much to change fonts, colors, or backgrounds outside a few preset themes, but I still thought there was potential in the interface’s ability to juxtapose ideas on what amounted to a virtual whiteboard. It now has a much more customizable interface and a great deal of flexibility, but it maintains the central concept of allowing for the arrangement of visual information on a zoomable canvas.
However, the results of Prezi’s own “Best Prezis of 2014” list released this month suggest that Prezi has come further in visual gimmickry than in effective communication. The winning presentations are definitely gorgeous: the Agrimore visual introduction uses effective scaling graphics and feels like an animation built intentionally through slides, while Hedwyg van Groenendaal’s zooming Prezi My love for books moves effectively if dizzyingly from libraries to the page. However, as Derek Bruff pointed out, the Prezis are disappointing in their use of visual metaphor. As he writes, this is particularly disappointing in the case of the “Best Educational Prezi:"
“Spatial arrangements aren’t used to convey meaning, except in a couple of small ways. Zooming out to see the entire prezi shows all the animals in one big scene — some in the river, some in the trees, some on the land — which gives a very rough sense of what the ecosystem look like. And there’s a nice zoom from a toucan to a tree frog that gives a good sense of the size difference between the two animals. Otherwise, the presentation is a really attractive example of style over substance...I believe that there are educational prezis out there that do a great job of using spatial arrangements to convey meaning. And I aim to find them.”
In response to the frustrating examples set by Prezi’s own awards, Derek Bruff has launched his own “Agile Learning Educational Prezi Awards 2015"--you can nominate your own presentations or the work of others through January 31st. I for one hope his informal awards process surfaces some inspirational Prezi design I haven’t seen before.
I use Prezi for nearly all my research talks, as I’ve written about here on ProfHacker in the past. Others have found Prezi useful for particular circumstances: Katy Meyers has noted that Prezi is flexible and powerful, but also overwhelming and potentially distracting; Kimon Keramidas repurposed Prezi for student projects on the study of visual materials and wireframes; and Ryan Cordell was converted somewhat to Prezi for discussing text analysis at scale. However, I believe we need more compelling examples of educational Prezi use to demonstrate the power of visual organization for more than marketing.
Have you seen an inspiring educational Prezi? Share your links in the comments!
[Screenshot of my Games in the Classroom Prezi]
