Nine Presentation Tips for Students 1 Create Classroom Presentations - - PDF document

Nine Presentation Tips for Students1 Create Classroom Presentations Worthy of an 'A' Making effective classroom presentations takes practice, but with a few tips up your sleeve, you are ready to take on the challenge.

• 1. Know Your Topic

Students usually want to charge right in and start using the presentation software immediately. Do the research first and know your material. Think through what you will present before beginning the project on the computer. Creating the slide show is the easy part. The best classroom presentations are created by people who are comfortable with what they are going to talk about.

• 2. Use Key Phrases about Your Topic

Good presenters use key phrases and include only the most important information. Your topic may be vast, but choose only the top three or four points and make them several times throughout the presentation in the classroom.

• 3. Avoid Using Too Much Text on the Slide

One of the biggest mistakes students make in classroom presentations is in writing their whole speech on the slides. The slide show is meant to accompany your oral presentation. Write in the form of jot notes, called bullet points, on slides. Use simple language and limit the number of bullets to three or four per slide. The surrounding space will make it easier to read.

• 4. Limit the Number of Slides

Too many slides in a presentation will cause you to be rushing to get through them, and your audience might end up paying more attention to the changing slide than to what you are saying. On average, one slide per minute is about right in a classroom presentation.

• 5. Layout of Your Slide is Important

Make your slides easy to follow. Put the title at the top where your audience expects to find it. Phrases should read left to right and top to bottom. Keep important information near the top of the slide. Often the bottom portions of slides cannot be seen from the back rows because heads are in the way.

1 El texto fue editado del documento original creado por: Wendy Russell, www.about.com

• 6. Avoid Fancy Fonts

Choose a font that is simple and easy to read such as Arial, Times New Roman or Verdana. You may have a really cool font on your computer, but save it for other uses. Don't use more than two different fonts – one for headings and another for content. Keep all fonts large enough (at least 18 pt and preferably 24 pt) so that people at the back of the room will be able to read them easily.

• 7. Use Contrasting Colors for Text and Background
• Dark text on a light background is best. This combination offers the most visibility.

Sometimes though, you may want a dark background for effect, to dazzle the crowd. In that case, be sure to make text a light color for easy reading in a classroom presentation.

• Text is often difficult to read on patterned or textured backgrounds.
• Keep your color scheme consistent throughout your classroom presentation.
• 8. Try a Slide Design Template to Keep the Look Consistent

When you use a design template, choose one that will not detract from your classroom

• presentation. Test it ahead of time to make sure that the text will be readable and the graphics

won’t get lost in the background.

• 9. Use Animations and Transitions Sparingly in Classroom Presentations

Let's face it. Students love to apply animations and transitions every place they can. This will certainly be entertaining, but rarely will the audience be paying attention to the message of the presentation. Apply animations to graphics to make a point, not to entertain. Using preset animation schemes will apply action to titles and bullet points, keeping the slide show consistent and interesting. Remember, the slide show is a visual aid and not the objective of the classroom presentation.

Nine Presentation Tips for Students1 Create Classroom Presentations Worthy of an 'A' Making effective classroom presentations takes practice, but with a few tips up your sleeve, you are ready to take on the challenge.

• 1. Know Your Topic

Students usually want to charge right in and start using the presentation software immediately. Do the research first and know your material. Think through what you will present before beginning the project on the computer. Creating the slide show is the easy part. The best classroom presentations are created by people who are comfortable with what they are going to talk about.

• 2. Use Key Phrases about Your Topic

Good presenters use key phrases and include only the most important information. Your topic may be vast, but choose only the top three or four points and make them several times throughout the presentation in the classroom.

• 3. Avoid Using Too Much Text on the Slide

One of the biggest mistakes students make in classroom presentations is in writing their whole speech on the slides. The slide show is meant to accompany your oral presentation. Write in the form of jot notes, called bullet points, on slides. Use simple language and limit the number of bullets to three or four per slide. The surrounding space will make it easier to read.

• 4. Limit the Number of Slides

Too many slides in a presentation will cause you to be rushing to get through them, and your audience might end up paying more attention to the changing slide than to what you are saying. On average, one slide per minute is about right in a classroom presentation.

• 5. Layout of Your Slide is Important

Make your slides easy to follow. Put the title at the top where your audience expects to find it. Phrases should read left to right and top to bottom. Keep important information near the top of the slide. Often the bottom portions of slides cannot be seen from the back rows because heads are in the way.

• 6. Avoid Fancy Fonts

1 El texto fue editado del documento original creado por: Wendy Russell, www.about.com

Choose a font that is simple and easy to read such as Arial, Times New Roman or Verdana. You may have a really cool font on your computer, but save it for other uses. Don't use more than two different fonts – one for headings and another for content. Keep all fonts large enough (at least 18 pt and preferably 24 pt) so that people at the back of the room will be able to read them easily.

• 7. Use Contrasting Colors for Text and Background
• Dark text on a light background is best. This combination offers the most visibility.

Sometimes though, you may want a dark background for effect, to dazzle the crowd. In that case, be sure to make text a light color for easy reading in a classroom presentation.

• Text is often difficult to read on patterned or textured backgrounds.
• Keep your color scheme consistent throughout your classroom presentation.
• 8. Try a Slide Design Template to Keep the Look Consistent

When you use a design template, choose one that will not detract from your classroom

• presentation. Test it ahead of time to make sure that the text will be readable and the graphics

won’t get lost in the background.

• 9. Use Animations and Transitions Sparingly in Classroom Presentations

Let's face it. Students love to apply animations and transitions every place they can. This will certainly be entertaining, but rarely will the audience be paying attention to the message of the presentation. Apply animations to graphics to make a point, not to entertain. Using preset animation schemes will apply action to titles and bullet points, keeping the slide show consistent and interesting. Remember, the slide show is a visual aid and not the objective of the classroom presentation.

PowerPoint Presentations - The Good, the Bad and the Ugly2 PowerPoint - The Good

• 1. Easy to use

The most obvious feature of PowerPoint, no matter the version, is that it is so easy to use. It is a great tool for business and for teachers, to integrate technology into the classroom.

• 2. AutoCorrect

All of Microsoft Office products have a feature called AutoCorrect. As the title suggests, PowerPoint will automatically correct many common errors as you type. Some of the examples that are very helpful are

• 3. List font names in their fonts

This handy feature lets you see how the font will look, before you apply it, right in the font

• list. To activate this option if it is not already turned on, choose Tools > Customize from the

menu.

• 4. Master slides

Editing the master slides, lets you customize your presentation to suit your specific needs. For example, if you want a specific font to be used on all slides, rather than make this change on each individual slide, set this option on the master slides, so you only need to do this once.

• 5. Package your presentation to play on another computer

This feature, known as Package for CD in PowerPoint 2003, or Pack and Go in PowerPoint 2000 will pack up all the components of your presentation, including all the fonts used and any sounds or pictures you have embedded, so that you can then play your presentation on another computer. You can choose to include the PowerPoint Viewer as well, so that your presentation can even be played on computers that do not have PowerPoint installed.

• 6. Design templates / themes

Each version of PowerPoint comes with a selection of design templates (PowerPoint 2003 and earlier) or design themes (PowerPoint 2007) that you can apply to your presentation to coordinate all the slides. You can download additional free templates from many sources to add to your selection choices.

• 7. Embed true type fonts

If you have a really nifty font that adds just the right element to your presentation, there is a chance that other computers may not have this font installed. The result can have disastrous effects on your slide show, if you play it on a different computer. The answer is to embed the true type fonts into the presentation and then those fonts will display just as you intended, on any computer.

• 8. AutoContent Wizard

Many frequent users of PowerPoint tend to downplay the value of the AutoContent Wizard. However, if you are new to making presentations, and don't know where to begin, use this feature as a starting place to generate ideas. This series of premade templates is designed to speed up the process of making a new

2 El texto fue editado del documento original creado por: Wendy Russell, www.about.com

• presentation. Many templates are included with each install of PowerPoint. Most of the

templates available in the AutoContent Wizard are slanted towards business presentations, such as a Business plan and Employee orientation, but there are still many generic types too, such as a Brainstorming session and Certificates. PowerPoint - The Bad Overall, I think PowerPoint is the best tool out there for making a quick and easy visual presentation to accompany your talk. However, there are a few features that annoy me, and I am sure I am not alone. In no particular order, how about ...?

• 1. Fast saves

It seems like a good idea. PowerPoint saves only the most recent changes, so it is a few seconds faster. However, it causes your file size to just keep growing and growing, sometimes to an unmanageable size, and for no good reason. This causes a real problem when you want to email your presentation. It is also the biggest reason for corrupt PowerPoint presentations.(But we can disable this option)

• 2. Automatic capitalization

One feature that I find extremely annoying in PowerPoint, and all the Microsoft Office products actually, is the default setting in the program to capitalize the first word in a line

• f text. This is one of the AutoCorrect features. I can see the point perhaps in Microsoft

Word, but not in PowerPoint. One of the main features of PowerPoint is creating slides containing bulleted text, which should not be sentences, but simply jot notes. These points do not need to begin with a capital letter.(We can stop this option too)

• 3. Start a new line without a bullet

At times you may want to type a second line of text pertaining to the same bulleted point. When you hit the Enter key, PowerPoint gives you a new bullet. This is not always what you

• want. (We can enable this)
• 4. Get rid of the Getting Started task pane

I don't know about you, but it irks me to have the Getting Started task pane appear each time I open PowerPoint. Most of the contents are redundant, because they are easily found

• elsewhere. The good news is that there is a quick fix for that.
• 5. Design themes/templates can be bad too

Design templates (PowerPoint 2003 and earlier) or design themes(PowerPoint 2007) are a wonderful helper in PowerPoint. They keep your presentation all coordinated and looking like a complete package. But, oh brother -- some of the choices leave a lot to be desired. Don't be fooled into thinking that just because the template/theme is part of the program, that it is a good choice for your material. Be selective and choose wisely for your topic.

• 6. Short menus

Short menus were designed to put the most often used features in that menu near the top. After you make a choice from the menu, it is reshuffled for the next time you access it. The result is that the menu is rarely the same, so you are always searching for the command you

• want. And -- you have extra clicks to get there.

• 7. Spell checker

This is really just a "pet peeve" -- and maybe it is just my pet peeve. I know -- Microsoft is an American company -- but not all users of PowerPoint are American. It is great that the spell checker finds all the misspelled words. I do take offense though, to the fact that most of the rest of the world spells these words as colour, favour, honour, neighbour and the program decides that they are spelling errors. These are not misspellings. PowerPoint - The Ugly This is really more about ugly PowerPoint presentations, rather than ugly features in PowerPoint. As I mentioned in the two previous pages, PowerPoint is really a great tool to use as an accompaniment to your oral presentation. However, many people believe that PowerPoint is the

• presentation. Not so.

Again in no particular order -

• 1. Poor font choices

A PowerPoint presentation usually has many slides that contain text. But if the audience can't read the text on the slides, what good are they? Make sure there is good contrast between the slide background color and the text color. Avoid script type fonts, as they are hard to read. Keep the fonts simple and don't use less than a 30 point font for easy reading in the back rows.

• 2. No graphics - all text presentations

Nothing is more boring than sitting through a PowerPoint presentation that contains only

• text. Keep your audience interested by including pictures and other graphics such as

pertinent charts that reflect the content of your presentation. Drive your point home with a picture rather than text.

• 3. Poor color choices

Avoid unusual or electrifying color choices. Many are unsettling to the audience, or hard to read, so they won't be listening for your message. Pick a background color that is suitable for the topic and make sure there is good contrast between the background and font color

• choices. If possible stick to two main colors and use a third color sparingly, as an accent.
• 4. Using PowerPoint as a crutch

So many presenters rely on PowerPoint as being their presentation. I cannot stress this enough -- you are the presentation. PowerPoint is an enhancement to the presentation. Along this vein, there are two frequent mistakes made by presenters.

Too much text

Do not write the complete content for the presentation on the slides. PowerPoint is meant only as an accompaniment to your oral presentation. If all you are going to do is write your whole speech on the slides, everyone could just stay home. Why would they need you? Keep the text to a minimum on your slides -- use "jot notes". Three or four bullet

points is plenty for a slide. If a simple graphic will illustrate your point, use it rather than text.

Reading the slides

Along with too much text on the slides, nothing is worse than a presenter who turns toward the screen and proceeds to read the slides to the audience. Again, what does the audience need you for? Email them a handout of the presentation and save everyone the time and money.

• 5. Too many animations

Animations are meant to add a little pizzazz to your presentation, and preferably grab the audience's attention for an important point. Use them sparingly and your presentation will be much more effective. Remember that old cliché "less is more".

• 6. Too many different transitions

Transitions are similar to animations in that they should be used only to enhance your

• presentation. If you use transitions, try to keep them simple and use the same one

throughout the presentation. The audience should be interested in your message, not how you can dazzle them with motion.

• 7. Inappropriate or too many sounds

Although sound effects are included with the program, and you can easily add your own, use music and sound effects either to make a crucial point (sound effect) or as subtle ambient background music. You can embed music into PowerPoint presentations or play tracks from a CD. Music, sounds or narration each have their uses in a variety of presentation situations. Use them wisely.

• 8. Design templates/themes again -- they can really be ugly

Although using the design templates can speed up the process of creating an attractive PowerPoint presentation, many of the templates are simply too busy or glitzy, and some are downright ugly, at least in my opinion. The simpler the better is always my choice. You want to use PowerPoint as an aid to get your message across. So many speakers forget that the audience came to see and hear them and not their PowerPoint accompaniment. Use the K.I.S.S. principle (keep it silly simple) when creating your visual presentation. Then you can be sure the audience gets the message you intended and was not just dazzled -- or worse -- mystified by what they saw on screen. 10 Most Common Presentation Mistakes Avoid These Predictable Presentation Mistakes By Wendy Russell, About.com What presentation mistakes are sure-fire ways to put your audience to sleep or send them running for the doors? Even the best presentation can be destroyed by a bad presenter -- from the person

who mumbles, to the one who talks too fast, to the one who just wasn’t prepared. But perhaps nothing is as irritating as the person who misuses and abuses presentation software. Read on to learn about the 10 most common presentation mistakes.

• 1. Presentation Mistake #1 - You Don't Know Your Topic!

You memorized the content (and it shows, by the way). Someone has a question. Panic sets in. You never prepared for questions and all you know about this topic is what is written on the slides. A better scenario Know your material so well, that you could easily do the presentation without an electronic enhancement such as PowerPoint. Nothing will ruin your credibility as a presenter faster, than not knowing everything about your topic. Use key words and phrases and include only essential information to keep the audience focused and interested. Be prepared for questions and know the answers.

• 2. Presentation Mistake #2 - The Slides Are NOT Your Presentation

An audience member says that she can't read the slides. You graciously tell her you will be reading them and proceed to do so, while looking up at the screen. Each of your slides in filled with the text of your speech. Why do they need you? A better scenario Always remember that you are the presentation. The slide show should only be used as an accompaniment to your talk. Simplify the content, by using bullet points for key information. Keep the most important points near the top of the slide for easy reading in the back rows. Focus on a single topic area for this presentation and use no more than four bullets per slide. Speak to the audience, not to the screen.

• 3. Presentation Mistake #3 - T. M. I. (Too Much Information)

You know so much about the topic, that you jump from here to there and back again talking about everything there is to know about your brand new widget, and no one can follow the thread of the presentation. A better scenario Use the K.I.S.S. principle (Keep It Silly Simple) when designing a presentation. Stick to three, or at the most, four points about your topic and expound on them. The audience will be more likely to retain the information.

• 4. Presentation Mistake #4 - Poorly Chosen Design Template or Design Theme

You heard blue was a good color for a design template or design theme. You found a really cool template/theme on the internet, with a beach scene. Water is blue, right? Unfortunately, your presentation is about some nifty new tools to show at a Woodcarvers’ convention. A better scenario Choose a design that is appropriate for the audience. A clean, straightforward layout is best for business presentations. Young children respond to presentations that are full of color and contain a variety of shapes.

• 5. Presentation Mistake #5 - Electrifying Color Choices

Audiences don't like unusual color combinations. Some are unsettling and red and green combos can't be differentiated by those with color blindness. A better scenario Good contrast with the background is essential to make your text easy to read.

• Dark text on a light background is best. Off white or light beige is easier on the eyes than

the typical white. Dark backgrounds are very effective, if the text is light for easy reading.

• Patterned or textured backgrounds make text hard to read.
• Keep the color scheme consistent.
• 6. Presentation Mistake #6 - Poor Font Choices

Small, script type fonts might look great when you are sitting 18 inches away from the monitor. You didn't consider the lady sitting 200 feet away from the screen who can't read them. A better scenario Stick to easy to read fonts such as Arial or Times New Roman. Avoid script type fonts which are hard to read on screen. Use no more than two different fonts – one for headings, another for content and no less than a 30 pt font so that people at the back of the room can read them easily.

• 7. Presentation Mistake #7 - Extraneous Photos and Graphs

You figured no one will notice that you didn't do much research on your topic if you add lots of photos and complicated looking graphs. A better scenario “Time is Money” is really true in today's world. No one wants to waste their time sitting through a presentation with no substance. Use photos, charts and diagrams only to emphasize key points of your presentation. They add a nice break to the material, and when used correctly, can only enhance your oral presentation. Illustrate, don't decorate.

• 8. Presentation Mistake #8 - W-A-Y Too Many Slides

Your vacation cruise was so fantastic that you took 500 photos, and put them all in a digital photo album to impress your friends. After the first 100 slides, snores were heard in the room. A better scenario Ensure your audience stays focused by keeping the number of slides to a minimum. 10 to 12 is

• plenty. Some concessions can be made for a photo album, since most pictures will be on screen

for only a short time. Be kind though. Think how much you enjoy everyone else’s vacation pictures!

• 9. Presentation Mistake #9 - Different Animations on Every Slide

You found all the really cool animations and sounds and used 85% of them in your presentation, to impress everyone with your flair. Except -- the audience doesn’t know where to look, and have totally lost the message of your presentation. A better scenario Animations and sounds, used well, can heighten interest, but don't distract the audience with too much of a good thing. Design your presentation with the "less is more” philosophy. Don't let your audience suffer from animation overload.

• 10. Presentation Mistake #10 - Hardware Malfunctions

The audience is settled. You are all set to start your presentation and - guess what? The projector doesn't work. You didn’t bother to check it out earlier. A better scenario Check all the equipment and rehearse your presentation, using this projector long before your time to present. Carry an extra projector bulb. If possible, check the lighting in the room you will be presenting in, prior to your time in the limelight. Make sure you know how to dim the lights if the room is too bright. By Wendy Russell, About.com