Storytelling and your brain

I just read a great article about the science behind storytelling, called What Storytelling Does to our Brains by Leo Widrich.

We all are getting pushed to use Powerpoint presentations, because that's the latest and greatest thing.
And yet.
And yet.
It turns out that things like powerpoint aren't the best way to get your message across.
(raise your hands if you've ever felt yourself falling asleep during a powerpoint presentation. Yup.  Me too.)

The brain is wired to react to storytelling.  It's looking for a beginning, a middle, and a satisfying ending. Keep this in mind the next time you prepare your presentation.

My take on this?
Go ahead and use your powerpoint to "illustrate" your story, but focus mainly on the story you want/ need to tell.

It's snowing

It's snowing in Maryland. A week before Thanksgiving. This is the earliest I remember snow happening here. Whatever happened to global warming? Not only is it snowing, but it's sticking to the tree leaves and on the grass.

The Weather service predicts a wetter than normal winter. Combined with cold means that middle states like Maryland could be in for a series of ice storms. Oh goodie. My least favorite weather. At least this year I'm working at a library near a major highway. When we had ice storms in the 1990s, I was working at a country library and was terrified driving those winding roads curving down to the two rivers I had to cross and then back up the hills, again.

The first snow storm of the year was last Tuesday. (Okay, they were snow showers.)
I drove through snow showers as I was returning home after having given a program at one of the Enoch Pratt Free Library branches about my adventures while researching the various books I wrote. (I was shot at when on an Air Force Base. I raced through a bad section of a town, taking pictures of buildings. I stood for hours taking pictures in 20 degree F. weather. (that's below freezing for those of you who only know Celcius ) And I was stalked at the Jefferson Memorial -- by a photographer for a cable program.

As I arranged the transparencies spread out all over my bed preparing for this program, I kept mumbling to myself that pretty soon I was gonna need to put all this stuff on powerpoint. Which means buying the software, the projector, and taking the time to learn the program and putting it together.
-wendieO