Hello students! We know that sometimes, especially if you’re not speaking in your native language, making a presentation can be really tough. And, if you’re a young student, it’s really possible that you end up doing a lot of these, and you may feel a bit lost. So, that’s why we have made this post!
We have divided the making of a presentation into 3 different processes, which are organisation, content and body language.
To organise your presentation, you want to focus on three questions:
What do you want to talk about?
Who are you talking to?
Why is your topic important?
What do you want to talk about is the first thing you must ask yourself before starting to right anything. You need to have a clear topic, a clear structure in your head to deliver the presentation, and of course, you must be familiar with your topic.
Who are you talking to is another important question, because it’s not the same to present in front of 30 people than in front of 8 or 100, if you know your audience or not, if the intended audience is from your age, younger, or older… Knowing your audience can make the difference between delivering an interesting presentation, or a boring one, because you want to adapt your vocabulary and the way you act to engage with them.
Finally, why is your topic important is a question you have to ask yourself to be confident when you have to speak in front of the people. You know what you want to talk about, you can speak properly, and your presentation is going to be interesting for everybody (or at least, that’s the mindset you need). Of course, knowing your audience plays a crucial role in this question, because you want to adapt your topic so that it results interesting for whoever comes to listen to you.
Then, of course, the content. A good content is of course necessary to deliver a presentation, but only having a good content is not sufficient, you need to deliver your presentation in an interesting way. And of course, and this is very important, do not flood your audience with data! Tip: no one will remember 250 different dates, 35 graphs and 3 mind maps (in fact, if I had to ask you which numbers I have just written, you’ll probably need to read them again). So, keep your info short and simple, and everyone will be able to understand it.
As for the design of the presentation, DO NOT PUT EVERYTHING YOU ARE GOING TO SAY IN YOUR SLIDES! Like, really, everyone can read in a screen, but keeping your presentation simple and then giving the info your audience expects will make people feel more attracted to what you’re saying. It’s also important to not use very colourful slides, because that makes reading more difficult (black background with a white font, or a white background with a black font are your best friends).
Finally, and the most important thing, body language. It is said that body language makes up for at least 92% of a conversation. That’s a number to have into account, right? To give an appropriate body language, the first thing you should do is control the room. How do you do that? Move when you feel like you need to (in a normal, non-accelerated, non-nervous way), project your voice so that everyone can hear you properly, and try to make your audience feel like they’re important, like you’re talking specifically to them. How? Maintain eye contact with everyone (or at least, pretend like you’re). And of course, do not fold your arms! You don’t want to give a defensive image, try to speak with your arms wide open so you project the image of a confident person, like you’re ready for every question they throw at you.
That’s it! It’s a lot to process, but we hope you have found it interesting. Attached you can see how we would deliver this same presentation if we had to present it to our students. See you!
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/127-Sv9-psZguDGDJvGaQX_bfxILyCREdhYSoZuUy54k/edit?usp=sharing
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