Experiences Relate to Our Readings

            The Dragonfly Effect by Jennifer Aaker and Andy Smith (with Carlye Adler) is a book about “quick, effective, and powerful ways to used social media to drive social change” (cover).  According to their model, social change can be compared to a dragonfly by the way that it is broken down.  It is broken down into the body of the dragonfly and its four wings.  The body stands for the goal which all the wings are helping to achieve.  The four wings stand for Focus, Grab Attention, Engage, and Take Action.  The wings of the dragonfly can be related to more than social change in businesses.  For example, Wing Two:  Grabbing Attention, has been used in our first year seminar class.

            There were many different design principles that explain how to grab the attention of the audience that you are trying to reach out to.  One of the ways that the book said was effective was to use visual helpers.  According to a study, people who only listen to a presentation only retain about ten percent of the information given while presentations that included visuals along with audio had people retaining about fifty percent of the information.  This relates to our class because when our guest speaker came in and spoke to us about service learning, she gave her presentation with a visual slideshow of pictures that she had taken throughout her life.  Also, during our visit to the library Mr. Conley used a visual aid when he was showing us about the different parts of the library on the siena.edu website.  As you can see, visual aids help people retain more information.

            Another one of the design principles that The Dragonfly Effect outlines in Wing Two is the fact that unexpected things grab audiences and make them want to learn more.  The things that we do in our first year seminar are not what I had imagined going into college.  I was expecting lecture halls and classes with desks but I have been proven wrong.  We go to many places and learn hands on instead of learning through books and paperwork.  Out of the classes that I am taking right now, this is one of my favorites because of the unexpected and exciting things that we do every day.  As you can see, the aspects of Wing Two of The Dragonfly Effect can be used for more than just campaigns.