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What is a good presentation?
1. Audiences prefer to the presentation that
- is professional and delivered by a credible and confident speaker;
- seems to be tailored for the audience and clear in structure;
- has clear slides with minimal details and appropriate images to support;
- has interesting, curious and counterintuitive information;
- is easy to follow — not too technical;
- is delivered in a friendly and relatively informal way; and
- has interaction with the audience.
(Wallwork, 2010) |
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2. Procedures of preparation
In brainstorming your presentation, you need to think about:
- what your purpose is; and
- whom your audiences are.
Then you will
- structure your presentation and write a script or a draft;
- summarize core points to write on the slides; and
- deliver your speech.
Finally, map your presentation.
Introduction:
- Informing the audience of your name and objectives
- Presenting the outline of your talk
- Providing background information
- Thanking the audience for coming to your session ( for presenting at a conference)
Body:
- Pointing out your views one by one
- Illustrating your views by examples.
Conclusion
- Summarizing what you have covered
- Restating the objective to show your achievement of the aim
- Pointing out the solution to the problem or the tendency of the issue
- Thanking the audience and invite questions
(University of Sussex, 2011) |
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How to prepare your script?
1. Dos
- Using more short sentences than long ones
- Including one idea per sentence
- Repeating key words
- Using more verbs than nouns
- Conveying ideas with more active forms than passive forms
- Paragraphing unfamiliar words
- Giving important and valuable information only
- Using present simple tense to illustrate the general background
- Using present perfect tense to report your progress
2. Don’ts
- Avoiding synonyms for the key words or technical words
- Avoiding quasi-technical terms
- Avoiding general quantities and unspecific adjectives like a few, some....
(Wallwork, 2010) |
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How to prepare your presentation slides?
1. title:
- a verb and propositions.
- a two-part title: a non-technical title to attract the nonprofessionals + a technical subtitle to appeal to experts
2. Information
- Limiting within 10 lines on one PPT page
- Writing confirmed information
- Shortening the information after bullets — phrases and short clauses are recommended
- Keeping the first word grammatically the same after each bullet
- Avoiding UPPER CLASS TYPE only
- Using household acronyms, abbreviation and symbols without explanation
- Deleting information in brackets
- Keeping the quotation short (using “…”.)
3. Visual components
- Assuring that audience at the back can see the visual elements clear
- Using different colors or styles to distinguish categories especially in a line chart
- Keeping relevant among the content, drawings and background on your slides
- Checking the equipment carefully before your presentation (especially for animations)
4. Bullets and fonts
- Less than two layers of bullet on one page
- Less than two types of font on one page
- Larger fonts in titles and headings
5. Make sure your slides error-free.
(Wallwork, 2010; Newcastle University, 1997) |
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Presentation Samples
1. Clear presentations
- A class presentation
- Normal speaking volume
- Talking to audience
- Simple and short language
- Smiling and eye-contact
2. Bad presentations
- Bad public speaking examples
- Reading the script
- Low voice
- Nervousness — playing with hair
- Moving back and forth
- No eye-contact
- Crazy MBA student presentation
- To many movements
- Too much body and facial language
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Other online resources
1. Presentation strategies
2. TED Ideas worth spreading: Sample of the excellent presentations and speeches
3. Online corpora of academic speaking:
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