1. How to Create an Oral Research Presentation
Riverside High School
Research Biology

2. Purpose of a research talk
Is not to
Impress the audience
Tell them all you know about a subject
Present every little detail of your work
Is to
Give the audience a sense of what your idea/work is
Make them want to read your paper/research
Get feedback on your work

3. Know your audience

4. Know your audience Who would be there?
Teachers
Scientists not expert in your field
Students
Non experts
Who knows?
Most likely a mix so have something for all

5. Know your audience Keep in mind What can you do? They might be tired
They can read 
They are thinking “Why should I listen?”
Non-experts will tune off within 2 minutes
Experts after 5 minutes
What can you do?

6. What can you do?
Early motivation - at the beginning of your talk motivate your research with easy to understand examples
Spoil the punch line - State your results early and in simple terms
Visuals – Illustrate your idea with images and diagrams

7. Leave them with these thoughts
I understood what the problem was and why it was important
I have an idea of what the solution was and how it was different/better than others

8. The skeleton What is the problem Motivation and goals
Relevant state of the art
What is your key idea/contribution
Why is your approach good/better
What I just said and what I want to do next

9. Preparing the presentation
Less is more. Fill in with narration not words
Use color to emphasize some points but limit to 2 or 3
Be consistent! In the choice and use of color font size/type etc
Use slide real estate appropriately

10. Technical Aspects of a Presentation: Slide Layout
Avoid text heavy slides
Avoid full paragraphs unless quoting
Create a slide for EACH main point because it
keeps presentation focused
helps the audience concentrate on each point
Prevents audience from reading ahead

11. Slide layout - Bad
This page contains too many words for a presentation slide. It is not written in point form, making it difficult both for your audience to read and for you to present each point. Although there are exactly the same number of points on this slide as the previous slide, it looks much more complicated. In short, your audience will spend too much time trying to read this paragraph instead of listening to you.

12. Slide layout – Good Show one point at a time:
Will help audience concentrate on what you are saying
Will prevent audience from reading ahead
Will help you keep your presentation focused

13. Technical Aspects of a Presentation: Fonts
Use a decent font size (minimum 18 pt)
Use different size fonts for main points and secondary points
The title of the slide should be about 44 point
The body of the slide should be about 22 point You do not want your font too small so that your audience has to strain to read it!
Use a standard font like Times New Roman or Arial

14. Fonts: Good
18 point
20 point
24 point
28 point
36 point
44 point

15. 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
CAPITALIZE ONLY WHEN NECESSARY. IT IS DIFFICULT TO READ
Don’t use a complicated font
Use the same font style throughout

16. Technical Aspects of a Presentation: Color
Use a text color that contrasts with the background
Use color for emphasis
Keep colors simple; less is more
Use colors sparingly
Use colors to tie points together

17. Color - Good Use font color that contrasts sharply with the background
Blue font on white background
Use color to reinforce the logic of your structure
Ex: light blue title and dark blue text
Use color to emphasize a point
But only use this occasionally

18. 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
Same for secondary points
Trying to be creative can also be bad

19. Technical aspects of a presentation: Background
Use simple backgrounds that provide some visual interest
Always use the same background throughout the presentation
Try not to use backgrounds that are distracting or make it difficult to read the words

20. Background - Good
Use backgrounds such as this one that are attractive but simple
Use backgrounds which are light
Use the same background consistently throughout your presentation

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

22. Components of an Oral Research Presentation
Title Slide with Research Question
Background/Literature Review
Research Model
Experimental Design
Research Methods
Findings/Data – tables, graphs, summary
Discussion/Conclusion(s)
Experimental Errors
Future Research
References

23. Title Slide Each presentation will have a title slide
The title slide must contain the title of your project
Add the Research Question
It must include your name and group members names, your faculty mentor’s name and department, and the name and location of your institution

24. Research Question(s)
Research Question – it should stand alone on this slide
The goal is to showcase your research question so that your audience can let it sink in for a moment
Research Question
What is the impact of pyrethrin insecticide on decreasing flea population on domestic dogs?

25. Title Slide Examples

26. Introduction
This is the section where you should explain why this research is important
Give your audience the broader impact of your research so that they will have some context to put your scientific data into

27. Background/Literature Review
 This will be more of a background section, but you will cite your sources
This section is where you start to discuss other studies that have been performed
 Key concepts
Student understandings – what are the main concepts in your study

28. Research model
Add the research model to discuss your major science theme and research question

29. Research Methods
In this section you should share with your audience how you went about collecting and analyzing your data
Put methods in bullets with pictures of your experiment. Can be combined?

31. Good or Bad?

32. Results/Data
In this section you want to clearly organize and display your data and findings
 This is where graphs, charts and images are most helpful
Let the data do the talking in this section and just explain the graphs, charts and images that you are presenting to your audience
 You will analyze and discuss this data in the next section

33. Graphs - Good Use graphs rather than 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

34. Do’s and Don’t’s of Graphs
Not every table and graph is good
Do your best to display your data in the most clear, concise way possible
 Remember that your audience will only have a minute or less to view your table/graph
Is this an example of a good table?

35. Do’s and Don’ts of Graphs
The following is a much better way to display the data on the previous slide
Why is the graph so much better than the table on the previous slide?

36. Graphs - Bad

37. Graphs - Good

38. Graphs - Bad

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

40. Results Add a bulleted summary of the findings
Include p value (if applicable)
Reject or accept null hypothesis

41. Discussion/Conclusion(s)
Section is a concise summary of your main findings
 Ideally you should be able to state the answer to your research question that you initially posed in the beginning
 include the p value (if applicable) when describing the data
Accept or reject the null hypothesis
How does the data support the claim
Give evidence
 why did the IV cause a change in the DV
Answer your initial research question

42. Experimental Errors
Explain what may have gone wrong in your experiment
How could you improve the experiment if repeated
Do not simply write, our data was bad?

43. Future Research State your goals in a bulleted format
Add a sentence about why you believe the research should go in this direction
You may want to briefly mention how you plan to implement these research goals
What would you do next time?

44. References
In this section you do not want to include your entire reference list that is in your research paper
It’s best to include 3-5 key references
Be sure your references are in the proper format - APA

45. Acknowledgements
This section is used to thank the people, programs and funding agencies that allowed you to perform your research.
Be sure to thank:  * Your faculty mentor  * Any students that may have helped you  * And anyone else you may want to add

46. Preparing the presentation
Prepare the slides in advance
Show them to friends
When you think you are done read them again
Check all animations with the sound on 

47. Preparing the presentation
Practice, practice, practice
Give a practice talk to a general audience
Give a practice talk to an audience of expert
Time your presentation (allow for speed up effect caused by nervousness)
Always assume technology will fail you. Have backups.

48. Delivering the talk
Be enthusiastic! If you aren’t why should the audience be?
Make eye contact with the audience
Identify a few “nodders” and speak to them
Watch for questions. Be prepare to digress or brush off when irrelevant

49. Delivering the talk Point at the screen not the computer
Do not read directly from the PPT or your notes
Have the “spill” for the first couple of slides memorized in case you go blank
Finish in time

50. Handling questions Different types – handle accordingly
Need clarification
Suggest something helpful
Want to engage in research dialog
Show that he/she is better than you
Anticipate questions (additional slides)
Don’t let them highjack the talk (postpone)

51. ANY QUESTIONS?