Guidelines for Project Presentation Mei-Chen Yeh 04/03/2012

Reminder Scheduled on April 10, % of the overall grade, with the following evaluation components: – Technical depth – Novelty – Presentation minutes, in English (Slides and Speech)

Presentation outline Introduction – project development overview – reasons why you chose the approach(s) Approach – procedure, parameter settings, … – please do not repeat the lecture slides Experimental results – bull’s eye test score, search time Conclusion

Presentation order Your destiny lies in your own hands!

Guidelines for Giving Good Presentations Modified from slides offered by Prof. Matthew Turk, UCSB

Why Bother? Giving good presentations is an important skill – MS, PhD: thesis proposal and defense – Conference talks – Job interviews – Presentations to managers – More…. You are judged by your ability to communicate – If they didn’t get it, it’s not their fault!

Communication Why are you making a presentation? – To communicate something to an audience – Don’t give a talk, rather, communicate a message Communication is two-way – Speaker and audience – Give and receive

Your Audience Listening is hard work. Your job is to make it easy. Continually ask yourself: – Does the audience get it? – How can I tell? Give the audience time to think – Remember, they don’t know the material like you do! Especially true for equations and figures – They need to be digested. Spend time on them. Especially true for new terms and definitions – Explain and then remind, remind, remind!

Presentation Style Speak clearly – Slow enough, loud enough Speak to the audience, not the whiteboard or screen Use examples to illustrate a point Point to the screen (not the computer) – Walk over and point better than laser pointer

PowerPoint Don’t overdo PowerPoint flashiness KISS principle (Keep it simple and ?) Good use of color Good slides: – Highlight the key points – Don’t give more detail than necessary – Have a large enough font size

The Message Main question: What do you want to communicate? Use a top-down approach: – Give the “Big Picture” first: What and why – Then go into detail, often referring back to the Big Picture – Like good programming

Communicating the Message In other words, summarize at the beginning and again at the end 1.Tell the audience what you’re going to tell them 2.Tell them 3.Tell the audience what you told them

Emphasize What’s Important Much of the presentation material is already known, obvious, or not too critical – This is okay! Hence the new and important material can get lost in the shuffle Clearly differentiate the important stuff – Tone of voice, body language – Visual aids (tastefully done, please) – Tell them! – Relate it to what they already know

Repetition Repeat the important points at different times – 20% or more of the audience at any given time are thinking about something else – They haven’t thought about this as much as you Emphasize the main message repeatedly Remind audience the second time a new definition or term is seen (and maybe third, and fourth) Remember, listening to a talk is hard work!

Engage the Audience Talks are soothing, people are tired Ask questions to keep people's brains actively engaged Make eye contact Don’t just talk to one person Try to make the examples interesting

Warning! You may need to choose between impressing people and communicating with them.

Summary Presentations are about communication, not talking Communicate, don’t impress Listening is hard work. Your job is to make it easier. Give the audience a chance to think and digest the material Speak clearly and to the audience Top-down approach: what’s the main message? Repeat, repeat, repeat Engage the audience Summarize at the beginning and again at the end