Presentation Advice

All students must give several presentations throughout the semester. This guide focuses on the general advice for presentations. See the individual guides on each presentation for speaker requirements.

General Advice

No matter what your eventual career, being able to communicate technical content to your peers will be an important skill to master. The in-class presentations give you opportunities to practice this in a safe and supportive environment with an engaged audience.

Not everyone will be a skilled orator! That is why presentation grades are broken into categories, giving students the ability to choose areas other than delivery to excel in.

In addition to the advice below, take a look at these slides for more advice on giving presentations.

Timing Advice

It is important to practice, practice, and practice (not just in your head; speak out loud). However, keep in mind that the actual presentation time might be more or less than what you practiced:

• There are many reasons why your presentation might be longer than expected. For example, you might run into technical difficulties. Or, nerves might make it harder to get certain words out, cause you to lose your place in your presentation, or forget what you wanted to say. In that case, you will need to know ahead of time what content is safe to skip so you still stay within time.

• There are many reasons why your presentation might be longer than expected. For example, you might speak faster than normal when nervous. Also, the more rehearsed you are, the more efficiently (and quickly) you will give that presentation. In that case, you will need some backup material to cover so you still stay within time.

Therefore, it is important to have flexibility in your presentation. Plan ahead of time what content can be skipped if your time runs long, and what backup content can be covered if your time runs short.

Content Advice

Each presentation has different required content. However, generally, you think about including the following content:

• Title: Include your name, date, and presentation title or topic.

• Introduction, Motivation, Context and/or Background: Indicate what the presentation is about first, and then discuss your motivation and any necessary background or context.

• Outline: Give the audience an idea of what to expect.

• Conclusion: Give the audience a take-away summary or thought near the end of the presentation.

• Resources: Where the audience can learn more, and any necessary attribution for the presentation content.

• Q&A Content: Something that indicates to the audience you are done presenting and are ready to take questions.

Consider building in pause points; places where you can non-awkwardly take a breadth (or drink of water). This includes putting up a short quote for the audience to read, or even better a comic to bring in some humor. Just be careful that everything is classroom-appropriate!

You may use presentation slides, websites, videos, interactive demos, and any other presentation aid you find helpful. No matter what you use, make sure the text is succinct (no “walls of text”) and readable from the back of the room. Pay attention to detail (i.e. use consistent capitalization, punctuation, correct spelling).

Speaking Advice

Try to make eye contact with the audience, focusing on different parts of the room throughout the presentation. (Do not stare at a single person; this might make that person uncomfortable.)

While it is okay to have speaker notes, avoid reading off a transcript during the presentation. This often causes an unnatural and monotone speaking pattern, forces the speaker to break eye contact with the audience, and causes issues if you lose your place in the text.

Try to speak loudly and project your voice to the back of the room. This one personally took me a lot of practice, and I still have people ask me to speak up in normal conversation! It might feel like you are shouting, but I have never had someone speak too loudly after being asked to speak up. (It is more likely you will still be speaking too quietly for everyone to hear.)

Try to avoid speaking too fast. Not only is it more difficult to understand, breathing can also become an issue when speaking too quickly. I still struggle with speaking so quickly when I am nervous that I have a hard time catching my breath! I find it helps to include pause points in the presentation (such as a comic, quote, or outline that people can read while I am catching my breadth). When I am not live-streaming, I like to stand slightly away from my laptop. That way, I have to pause and walk over to my laptop when I need to advance the presentation.

And finally, go to the Speaking Center! They will likely have better advice than I have for giving an effective presentation.