Hamberites Weigh In On Presentation Platforms

Photo Credit: Katja Radovic-Jonsson

What makes an engaging presentation? Body language, clear speech, aesthetics, and of course, a good presentation platform! Here is what Hamberites think of various presentation platforms.

Canva

Students and teachers have found Canva to be a great platform for presentations due to its premade templates.

Sondos Atie (10) thinks Canva is significantly easier to work with than other platforms. She can add small twists to the presentation “without having to go through so many steps,” and found that overall, Canva is much more aesthetically pleasing than PowerPoint.

Kaelyn Mak (11), who previously used PowerPoint, has recently discovered Canva, finding it “really easy to use”, especially with its wide variety of templates that allow for easy beautification. She noted that although some of the advanced features are stuck behind a paywall, the basic version of the platform is free to use and very accessible.

Ms. S. McEachern (Social Studies) also shared a positive experience with the platform, saying, “Canva is my best friend [...] and my go-to when I’m preparing my lectures or doing my own coursework.” She added that “in comparison to something like Google Slides, the options for adding graphics or making it very personalized are better [on Canva].” 

PowerPoint

Nicole Nesterov (9) uses PowerPoint for most, if not all, of her presentations. She sometimes finds the tool to change between languages troublesome and has not found a lot of “aesthetically pleasing” presentation designs. Still, she finds PowerPoint “more accessible to students” because students can use their school Microsoft 365 account to log in, which is not the case with Canva.

Tayler Ingram (11) also uses PowerPoint. “I like how it doesn’t cost extra money if I want features like in Canva,” she said. She also appreciates PowerPoint’s built-in templates.

Google Slides

Ms. McEachern characterized that the tools for creativity in Google Slides as “quite limiting.” She finds Google Slides’ creative tools mediocre compared to those of Canva. The other interviewees did not comment on Google Slides.