Prezi just launched Prezi Next, a new step in their development of free presentation cloud software. There's an unlisted video on YouTube showing some of the news.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wITkGxPBtng

Using Prezi Next in the classroom will be great, for two reasons. Prezi Next features two new features—non-linear navigation and presenter views—which are great for those of us who use it in the classroom. I'd like to explain briefly why.

Non-linear navigation: I'd venture to say that any of us who have ever stood in front of a class, have had to move back and forth in our lesson plan. Of course, the class was all perfectly planned, the day in advance, and we all know exactly the logic way that everything will move through the lesson, right? No. This is where non-linear navigation comes in. It is a perfect tool for those who believe in non-linear learning structures. That is to say, our brains are not necessarily thinking in a linear manner (nor in linguistic/language manners either but that's a topic for another blog post). Rather, the brain is about links and nodes in a network. The non-linear navigation in Prezi Next can help our students visualize this network of links and nodes. As you can see in the video above, you can easily structure your lesson plan in a linear way (for those who prefer to learn in that way) but you can also move back and forth in that structure, and show the interconnection between the different parts of the topic of the class.

Presenter views: This is perhaps more of a no-brainer when it comes to purpose for our classroom teaching. I'll say it anyway: in Prezi Next, you can add all of your notes for the different parts of your lesson plan as presenter notes, which will show in your presenter view, so you don't have to double up with printed pages (or several screens) with your notes. You'll look calm and collected, and it's easy for you, as well, to follow the non-linear structure that I discussed above.

I'm looking forward to using Prezi Next in the next class I'm teaching. Are you? Let me know in the comments.

Here are a few other good blog posts on how/why to use Prezi in the classroom: