73-Impose the 15-Word Gauntlet on your Students…Starring Arielle Brown and Ashlynn Hathaway

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Ashlynn Hathaway…Arielle Brown

If you’ve taught for any time what so ever, you’ve probably suffered through painfully boring student presentations. And if you were bored, think of the other students. Let’s strive to make such presentations are:

  • More attractive
  • More engaging
  • Less time-consuming
  • More interactive

In order to create such presentations, your kids must first run the gauntlet.

According to various sources, fifteen to twenty words is the average sentence length. That seemed long, till I actually wrote a sentence:

When I was in high school, I would have laughed uproariously

if anyone had informed me that I was destined to be a teacher. (24 words)

This will be a wonderful challenge for your students. They may revolt. Not only is it important to reduce the number of words, the limit will also hopefully dissuade copying and pasting. This awful practice flirts with plagiarism and makes for exceedingly dull presentations as students drone the words of another.

The fifteen-word limit encourages creativity. Students must populate slides with attractive images. They must animate slides with captivating stories. This leads to far more engaging presentations. 

As explained in the episode, another powerful engagement tactic is to have kids present to one another through Pear Deck. This will boost engagement ten-fold. The student presenter will monopolize the screens of his or her audience and that audience will have a front row seat to the presentation’s compelling images.

Episode Template

The Problem:

Student presentations are filled with boring slides that are text rich and image poor.

What you can do Tomorrow?

  • Direct students to create a one-sentence description of themselves. 
  • Create the 15-word Berlin Wall or, the 15-word 38th Parallel. 
  • Display fifteen-word examples on the board. 
  • Display the longest and shortest sentences. 
  • Inform students about the fifteen word maximum for the next presentation. 

Student presentations tend to be boring. Let’s make them engaging instead. Foster student creativity and ignite storytelling passion by limiting kids to fifteen words per slide.

Listen to “73-Impose the 15-Word Gauntlet on your Students…Starring Arielle Brown and Ashlynn Hathaway” on Spreaker.