Why Malaysian Universities Should Ban Using Powerpoint NOW

Who doesn’t have that one lecturer who relies way too much on PowerPoint?

They drone on, reading each bullet point, head turned away to the slide, while you and your peers hurriedly scribble away.

Does this method of learning work for you?

Lecturers in the USA are starting to frown on PowerPoint, arguing the over-reliance on slides are bad and would only make students more stupid. They said it has caused student’s to believe that reading textbooks and attending classes are unnecessary. 

Missed a class? Just print out the slides only la!

Thank goodness the teacher uses slides.

Research points in the same direction, with 3 reasons why PowerPoint should be trashed.

1. PowerPoint slides discourage deep analytical thinking, because it’s difficult to present these complex situations on a slide. It gives students the illusion of clarity.
2. Heavy use of slides make most students complain they were not provided with ‘proper notes’ but only bullet points.
3. Slides see students form unreasonable expectations. According to one teacher, their students expected the slides to contain every single detail: from their projects, tests and assignment deadlines. They neglect their textbooks and library.

But why is PowerPoint still used if it’s bad?

Most universities judged by student satisfaction rather than by how much and how well student’s learn. Students love powerpoint mainly because it’s much easier than textbooks and conveniently available online. So using PowerPoint scores well in rankings.

However, a survey was filled out by 2,300 undergrads and results revealed a staggering 45% of these students showed no improvement in a number of skills such as critical thinking and writing to name a few.

Should Malaysian universities make a move and kick out PowerPoint?

Althoughhh.. It’s loved by students.

Let’s not forget the times we cherished our freshly-printed-and-bound set of notes from PowerPoint.

You knew you were dead when you lost these

Or how there was no need to quickly scribble anything down as there were PowerPoint printouts.

Ain’t no writing for me

But, it clearly comes at a sacrifice. PowerPoint slides discourage analytical thinking, questioning and problem solving and researchers has said this method of teaching only makes students more stupid than the traditional textbooks.

So are our students becoming stupid? Since practically every lecturer uses one anyway.

Our Asian way of ‘learning’ is really just us memorising (or cramming for you procrastinators) and then vomiting out all of it on the exam paper. Ask me what I learnt 2 months ago and I would tell you I have no clue.

“DON’T TOUCH ME. MY MEMORY IS DELICATE.”

We become so dependant on slides. Even loosing just one slide is a big deal, because nothing else makes sense.

t.

Granted, it won’t be easy to wean ourselves from our beloved PowerPoint.

What do you guys think about PowerPoint?