So what about the use of slides during sermons? (I refuse to call it PowerPoint, because that is just the name of one of the worst tools for creating such presentations; the projections themselves are not “a PowerPoint”) Do visuals projected on a screen aid or hinder an audience’s understanding?
I’ve already written some in favor of the use of slides. Yet I know that the misuse of presentations has created as many problems as the use of such has solved.
Yesterday, I pointed some friends to an article from a few years ago that summarizes an important study on the use of text slides. This study found that projecting words on a screen and reading the same words simultaneously actually hurts understanding. In other words, if someone reads a portion of Scripture while that text is on the screen, people get less out of it. (The article was called The Death of PowerPoint (or at least, text slides))
I’d like to hear your thoughts. Do you find the use of a projector to be helpful or unhelpful as you listen to a sermon? Are there any things that particular help or hinder?
[For those who are wondering, I much prefers programs like Keynote or websites like Prezi for creating presentations]
Drawing by Frits Ahlefeldt
Great for pics, charts or maps etc but terrible for text as we cannot process and retain input from sight and sound; our brains choose one and suppress the other (so my reading in this area limited as it is); great for teaching in a class setting but not so much for preaching
Agree. We use presentations A LOT at work and there’s a reason they invented the bullet point!
So does that mean that reading along in an actual Bible while also listening to the passage being read, reduces understanding? Or does this somehow only pertain to slides?
Anyway, I’m pretty sure if PowerPoint had existed a couple thousand years ago, it would have been considered an abomination.
A side issue from a personal experience. Last year’s post-mission trip yielded a comment from a local Christian who is quite adept at public speaking: those who do not prepare good slides are lazy for not preparing sufficiently in advance in planning the audience’s benefit. The socio-cultural setting was such that he felt that slides were a necessity. Thus my question: are we “education delivery” dependent on the lecture in church? Many university classes work hard at minimizing the lecture. And we bring it front and center. Our goal is the spiritual growth through understanding and internalization by the audience. What “necessary” role do the slides fulfill?
Aunque es una buena herramienta, el uso de diapositivas puede hacer que el hermano que predica, se vuelva perezoso y le de mas importancia a este estilo de predicar, personalmente no estoy de acuerdo en usar ni “PowerPoint” ni otros programas. Dios les bendiga