What is a sidebar? You’ve seen them in magazines. A small box that juts out with additional information about the article you’re reading. Well, a PowerPoint slide can have a sidebar as well. A sidebar is meant to support and reinforce the main content of the slide. Laura Bergells is, among other things, a presentation coach. Laura points out that the presenter (the human) is the main content of the slide, and that the entire slide is actually a sidebar. However, sometimes content can be very dense and using the sidebar approach can help people break down the information into smaller, more easily digested pieces.

You can download a free sidebar template at Laura Bergells’s site: http://www.maniactive.com/states/2006/05/presentation-sidebar.html

I like a good mind-mapping tool. A mind-mapping tool is one that you can use to create a visually and content-rich map of any topic. Instead of the traditional linear outline (I, IA, IB, 2, 2A, 2B, etc), mind-mapping tools allow you to be a little more stream of consciousness. They allow you to bring all your ideas together, as they come to you.

Three mind-mapping tools that I have tried:

1. Inspiration: 30-day free trial; $69 thereafter [http://www.inspiration.com/]
2. Personal Brain: Lite version 100% free [http://www.thebrain.com]
3. Popplet: Free [http://popplet.com/]

I have used Inspiration quite a bit. The price has gone up over the years, but it is a good investment. It is relatively easy to learn and will turn your flow charts into outlines, which can be exported to Word. You can easily toggle between flow chart and outline view.
I was very excited about PersonalBrain and attended a training webinar, however, it didn’t do what I wanted it to do (I wanted it to be Inspiration, which it isn’t). PersonalBrain has a web-based brain option (WebBrain) that will sync with your personal brain that lives on your computer. It takes a brain to follow what I just said. The one feature that I really want from a mapping tool is the ability to make an outline from my far-flung thoughts. PersonalBrain doesn’t do that…so I moved on. It has been a number of months since I tried it, and it was in beta, so things may have changed.

Popplet is fun, and I want to have fun when creating a presentation or course content. It kind of behaves as a bulletin board where you can hang your ideas. You can include an image or a video in your Popplet, but it doesn’t pass my litmus test of exporting as an outline. You can however, export the Popplet as an image or PDF file. Popplet video http://tinyurl.com/38wmsbn

This link to a Wikipedia page has a list of free and cost-based mind mapping tools:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mind_mapping_software

During recent in-person classes, the NTC trainers tried out a free online polling tool called Poll Everywhere. We polled the class participants with multiple choice questions to check understanding of concepts during class, as well as presenting an open ended text question to gather comments from the class. Participants can respond to the poll through a text message on their cell phone or through a web browser. Most of the NTC class participants used the web browser method since they were already sitting at a computer.

Overall we found Poll Everywhere easy to use; question set up was simple. The presenter can control whether the participants see the poll results immediately or wait until the voting is completed. During our recent classes, Poll Everywhere generally worked without problems; we had one glitch with the results of an open-ended question appearing immediately, but that may have been due to a network issue in the teaching facility. If you plan to have participants send a text message response, you may need to explain the procedure; we found the text message instructions for the open-ended question to be confusing.

We received good feedback from participants in the classes; told us they liked using the polling program and asked us for information about the program we were using.

Poll Everywhere is free for up to 30 responses per poll (you can have as many polls as you like). Larger classes would require purchasing a monthly plan. In summary, we have had good results with Poll Everywhere and think it’s worth a look for use with in-person classes.