Smooth Sailing: An Exploration of Different Methods for Helping Students Visualize Difficult Legal Concepts

     How are law students like math students?  They struggle with word problems.  While these word problems look very different, the mastery struggles that these two types of students encounter are fundamentally similar: They are taught a concept (such as the legal research process or a four-pronged test for determining culpability in a particular legal scenario), often in conjunction with a particular hypothetical; they seem to understand the concept, and can even regurgitate the steps to you aloud; yet, when faced with a new hypothetical (a new word problem), they're lost. 
     A caveat: this session will not offer a fool-proof solution to this scenario.  If someone has that answer, come to this session - I'd love to hear it!
     Instead, this session will look at different kinds of presentation tools professors and law librarians might consider for explaining complex concepts to law students.  Going beyond, but including, PowerPoint, this session will look at the same sample legal concept presented in several different formats and will discuss the ways in which each method of presentation is effective and/or ineffective. Programs to be covered include, but are not limited to, PowerPoint, Prezi, SlideRocket, KeyNote, MindNode, Piktochart, and LibGuides.  Ashley will share her own experiences trying these various methods, and attendees are encouraged to share their experiences as well.
View presentation materials here.