...

, PowerPoint was appearing in lecture theatres and he was puzzled as to why teaching didn’t embrace the fundamental capacity all humans possess: to understand knowledge and meaning through imagery. He discovered it was being and still is used in the same way – as a means of shovelling information at audiences. Becoming more aware of the gap between how we teach (primarily with text) and how we learn best (with images and text), he transformed Death by PowerPoint into a visual feast of the mind that stimulates, engages and interests in ways that words cannot. The formula he developed uses apposite images and reduces text, to increase audience engagement, active learning, better recall and higher grades. David was voted Lecturer of the Year by his students because of this method. David Roberts has been an academic for 25 years. His research subject involves the building of peace after war in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. He wrote his doctoral degree from Phnom Penh and Hanoi at a time when war had all but halted regular supplies of electricity. His research centred on why the Khmer Rouge guerrillas refused to participate in the peacebuilding operation, and he followed this with investigations into leading Khmer Rouge officers, including Ieng Sary, before he was put on trial for crimes against humanity. He has worked for the American Red Cross in health planning in Southeast Asia, and was Honorary Research Fellow at the Archbishop Desmond Tutu Centre for War and Peace Studies. He is now researching indigenous resistance to liberal peacebuilding in places emerging from conflict. David teaches undergraduate introductions to International Relations, Third World Politics, and the violent impact of global governance on the most vulnerable people in the world. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx