1. Making PowerPoint Slides
Avoiding the Pitfalls of Bad Slides
Today, in my presentation, I would like to talk about how to make Powerpoint slides. As you may know, when it comes to a good speech, it’s always how and what the speaker says that gets all the attention. But have you ever thought of the importance of Powerpoint? A good Powerpoint can draw your audience’s attention, keep yourself focused, and make your points more salient. In short, it can make your speech better and efficient. To achieve this goal, in the following presentation, I will use both good examples and bad examples to show you some tips you should follow and some pitfalls you should avoid from when you are making your own Powerpoint.
杜佩璇 Vanessa Tu
National Chang-kung University

2. Outline Outline Slide Structure (amount; how it looks like)
Fonts / Color / Background
Graphs
Spelling and Grammar
Conclusion / Questions
Slide structure: How to design the Powerpoint to help your speech more understandable from the audience perspective.

3. 1. Outline Make your 2nd slide an outline of your presentation
Ex: previous slide
Follow the order of your outline for the rest of the presentation
Only place main points on the outline slide
Ex: Use the titles of each slide as main points

4. 2. Slide Structure – Principles (1/2)
Show one point at a time:
Help audience concentrate
Prevent audience from reading ahead
Help to keep yourself focused

5. 2. Slide Structure – Principles (2/2)
Word form:
Write in bullet points
Avoid wordiness
No more than 6 words per bullet points
Specialized terminology (專有名詞)
Amount of slides:
1-2 slides per minute of your presentation;
No more than 6 bullets per slide.
【Write in bullet points】, not in complete sentences
【Avoid wordiness】, use key words only
【No more than 6 words per bullet points】, if you use 10 words then your know that’s way too far. Say the points!
【Specialized terminology (專有名詞)】Don’t let the Chinese word steals the thunder of English words!

6. Slide Structure - Bad
First, long introductions at the beginning are a complete waste of time, just get to the point, spending too much time on it is unnecessary. Also, never apologize for being unclear, skipping points, having difficult-to-read visuals, etc. in the end of your presentation. You should prepare well. No excuses! Third, it’s a mistake to get too involved in the details; You should put those in the handout, but not on your slides. Furthermore, quoting figures is not as effective as telling anecdotes and stories to illustrate your point; capturing your audience’s interest and letting them understand you is the most important thing. Last, if your want to build rapport with your audience, make it like a conversation, not presentation.

7. The Five Golden Rules You Must Follow to be Effective in Presentations
Long introductions at the beginning are a complete waste of time – get to the point!
Never apologize for being unclear, skipping points, having difficult-to-read visuals, etc.
It’s a mistake to get too involved in the details – put those in the handout.
Quoting figures is not as effective as telling anecdotes and stories to illustrate your point/
Conversation, not presentation – that’s how to build rapport with your audience.

8. Remember the 5 steps to make your own words?

9. 5 Golden Rules Get to the point Never apologize
Save the details for the handouts
Tell stories
Think conversation, not presentation
5 Golden Rules

10. 5
Intros
Apologies
Details
Stories
Conversation
GOLDEN
RULES

11. 3. Fonts - Good Use at least an 18-point font Use different size fonts
this font is 24-point, the main point font is 28-point, and the title font is 36-point
Use a standard and clear font like
Arial, Calibri, Trebuchet, Tahoma.
Not: Times New Roman, Sylfaen

13. It’s normal size: 28 font

14. Fonts - Bad CAPITALIZE ONLY WHEN NECESSARY. IT IS DIFFICULT TO READ
If you use a small font, your audience won’t be able to read what you have written (Size: 12)
CAPITALIZE ONLY WHEN NECESSARY. IT IS DIFFICULT TO READ
Don’t use a complicated font. Don’t use a complicated font. Don’t use a complicated font. Don’t use a complicated front.

15. 4. Color - Good Use a color of font that
contrasts sharply with the background
Ex: black font on white background
reinforce the logic of your structure
Ex: brown title and black text
emphasize a point, but only occasionally

16. Color - Bad
Using a font color that does not contrast with the background color is hard to read
Using color for decoration is distracting and annoying.
Using a different color for each point is unnecessary
Using a different color for secondary points is also unnecessary
Trying to be creative can also be bad

17. 5. Background - Good Attractive but simple Contrast color with words
Use consistently throughout your presentation

18. Background – Bad
Avoid backgrounds that are distracting or difficult to read from
Always be consistent with the background that you use

19. 6. Graphs Use graphs, not just charts and words
Data in graphs is easier to comprehend & retain than is raw data
Trends are easier to visualize in graph form
Always title your graphs

20. Graphs - Bad

21. Graphs - Bad

22. Graphs - Bad Minor gridlines are unnecessary Font is too small
Colors are illogical
Title is missing
Shading is distracting

23. Graphs - Good
While the red balls maintain largely unchanged, the blue balls reach a peak in Match, but decrease dramatically afterwards.

24. increase
rise
grow
go up
fall
shrink
decline
decrease
go down
soar
rocket
take off
go up dramatically/ drastically enormously/ rapidly
plummet
plunge
slump
go down dramatically/ drastically/ enormously/ rapidly
fluctuate
recover
pick up
stabilize
level off
level out
remain steady
maintain largely unchanged
peak (+ at)
reach a peak
hit a low
bottom out

25. Describing a Pie Chart

26. Describing a Line Graph

27. 7. Spelling and Grammar Proof your slides for: Check, check and check!
speling mistakes
the use of of repeated words
grammatical errors you might have make
Check, check and check!

28. 8. Conclusion 3 ways/purposes: 4 closing techniques
Use an effective and strong closing
Your audience is likely to remember your last words.
3 ways/purposes:
Summarize
Give advice
Suggest future avenues of research
4 closing techniques

29. 9. Questions? How to deal with Q & A session: Remember:
Invite your audience to ask questions (“Any questions?”);
Prepare strips of questions
Ask questions according to your presentation content to reinforce important concepts (可以用a, b, c等選項讓觀眾選, 增加互動; 觀眾選完後, 公布答案或是表達自己的意見);
Remember:
Don’t end your presentation abruptly
Provide a visual aid (p.27 or p.28) during question period

30. Q & A (Sample) What is the main purpose of today’s lecture?
How to make effective Powerpoint slides;
How to convert Word to PDF;
How to like yourself;
How to learn English efficiently.

31. Q & A

32. Q & A session – How to respond?
Off-topic questions:
I think that raises a slightly different issue.
Sorry, I don’t quite see the connection.
Unnecessary questions:
Ah, perhaps I didn’t make that clear.
Well, as I might have mentioned / as I mentioned earlier,…
Multiple questions:
I think there are several questions there.
OK, let’s take those one at a time.
OK, so I think your main question there is…
Hostile questions:
I don’t have that information to hand.
To be quite honest with you, I really don’t know.

33. Q & A session – How to respond?
Difficult questions:
I’m afraid I don’t know that off the top of my head.
To be quite honest with you, I really don’t know.
I’m afraid I don’t have that information with me.
I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to your question, but I’ll try to find out for you.
What are your thoughts on the matter?
Hmm, I wonder what other people think?
I’m afraid I’m not in a position to answer this question. / I’m afraid that’s not my field.
I’ll find out. Can I get back to you on that?
So, if I understood you correctly, you would like to know whether … .
I’m sorry, could you repeat your question, please?
Say you don’t know
Ask for their thinking
Negotiate
Clarify the question

34. Q & A session – How to respond?
Good questions:
Good point.
That’s a very good question.
I’m glad you ask me that.
Ah, yes, thank you for reminding me.

35. “This is the end of my presentation
“This is the end of my presentation. I hope all of you enjoy my speech, thank you!”
Thank You!