Effective Presentations

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Effective Presentations
Mr. Steve Howard Mathematics Instructor Central
Virginia Governors School Lynchburg, VA
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Effective Presentations -The Parts

• Objective Convince/persuade/inform the
  audience
• Strategy How are you going to
  convince/persuade/inform
• Organization
• The Opening Catch the interest/attention of the
  audience
• State the objectives of your talk
• explain your research question
• Give specific detail/concepts/examples
  including graphics and charts
• method, experimental design, problems
• results, trends, statistical analysis
• Conclusion Summarize the main concepts youve
  discussed

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Effective Presentations -Initial Planning

• You will need to determine
• The type of talk you will give formal,
  informal, discussion
• Who your audience will be general, specialists
• the time allotted for your talk and will there
  be questions
• what the expectations for information content are

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Effective Presentations -Key Elements

• Keep the following in mind when preparing
• The optimal rate for a scientific talk is about
  100 words per minute (this is SLOW). Any faster
  and you will lose your audience.
• Catch the interest of your audience. There is
  no point in giving a presentation to an audience
  that is not listening.
• Know the length of your presentation and DO NOT
  RUN OVER!

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Effective Presentations -Key Dont-Do Elements

• Dont fidget with keys, change, hair, etc.
• Dont UH-UH the audience
• Dont mumble.
• Dont turn your back on the audience
• Dont have your presentation be a word-for-word
  reading of your slides
• Dont apologize for anything. Apologies are for
  when you didnt give it your best shot!
• And the MOST IMPORTANT aspect of a presentation

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Effective Presentations -THE Key Element

• PRACTICE
• PRACTICE
• PRACTICE

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Effective Presentations -Summary

• Know your audience
• Plan how you are going to convince your audience
• Develop a strategy for convincing your audience
• Clearly and concisely state your objective(s)
  for you talk
• Organize the details of your content that
  implement your strategy
• Summarize your results
• And Dont Forget to Practice!!