1. The Craft of Scientific Presentations
[Feynman] developed into an accomplished and inspiring teacher and lecturer, who gave virtuoso performances full of showmanship, humor, with his own inimitable brilliance, style, and manner. Jagdish Mehra
On these notes pages, the page and chapter numbers refer to The Craft of Scientific Presentations (Michael Alley, Springer-Verlag, 2003, ISBN ). Also referred to is the book’s web page:
At that page, you will find links to examples of presentation slides and color versions of the book’s illustrations. If you would like a 60-day evaluation copy of The Craft of Scientific Presentations, please go to the following web page:
This first slide is a title slide for a discussion about scientific presentations. Corresponding discussions about technical presentations in The Craft of Scientific Presentations appear in the Preface and Chapter 1. Richard Feynman appears on the cover of the book because he was considered such an excellent technical presenter. Also shown on the cover is a lightning experiment at the Deutsches Museum in Munich and a poster presentation at Penn State. Feynman, the experiment, and the poster presentation are discussed in more detail in the text. The quotation about Feynman comes from page 482 of The Beat of a Different Drum by Jagdish Mehra (Oxfor: Clarendon Press, 1994).

2. Because presentations are expensive, one should consider whether a presentation is truly needed
Cost in salaries of audience
Cost in time for presentation
This slide addresses the importance of scientific presentations. Corresponding discussions about the importance of scientific presentations can be found on pages 1-3 in The Craft of Scientific Presentations.
Cost in time to prepare presentation

3. Presentations have several advantages over documents
Work can come alive for audience
Work
Presenter can read audience and react A B C D
I usually begin my discussion of scientific presentations by having the students think of the advantages and disadvantages of presenting technical information in a presentation as opposed to a document. (CSP, pages 3-5, 7-8)
Presenter receives
instant reaction ! ?

4. Presentations also have several disadvantages
Speaker has limited
chance to catch errors ?
Audience cannot
reread text
has one
audience
chance
to hear
I usually begin my discussion of scientific presentations by having the students think of the advantages and disadvantages of presenting technical information in a presentation as opposed to a document. (CSP, pages 5-7)
Audience cannot look
up background material

5. Presentations can be viewed from three stylistic perspectives
Structure and
Speech
Visual Aids
Delivery
This slide maps a discussion about style in scientific presentations. In this discussion, one’s style in a presentation consists of three perspectives: the structure and speech of the presentation, the visual aids that one uses, and the delivery of the individual. Note that although the book breaks up the discussion into four perspectives, it is more balanced to divide a presentation of the material as three perspectives, especially if you are dedicating only three or four lectures to the material.
While the speech simply consists of the words that the speaker chooses, the structure includes not only the organization of the presentation, but also the depth, the emphasis, and the transitions between the major sections of the talk. The visual aids include presentation slides, handouts, demonstrations, and films. Finally, the delivery consists of the speaker’s voice, movements (including eye contact), and stage presence before the audience. (CSP, pages 8-11)
Archives, Cal-Tech

6. You begin preparing a scientific presentation
by analyzing your constraints
who are they?
what do they know?
why are they here?
what biases do they have?
audience
to inform
to persuade
to inspire
to teach
formality
size
time
purpose
occasion
This slide shows what constraints students are under as they begin preparing a scientific presentation. In other words, this slide tells students where they should begin the preparation process (an assumption here is that the students understand the content of their presentation and now must communicate that content). (CSP, pages 28-44)

7. As with documents, the structure of presentations should have clear beginnings, middles, and ends
This slide maps a discussion about organization in technical presentations. As with documents, all scientific presentations should have a clear beginning, middle, and ending. On this slide, I use the unusual shape to show that most successful scientific presentations begin with a bigger picture (perhaps a problem in engineering or science that needs addressing) and then focusing in on the work done. The middle is a discussion and analysis of that work, and the ending comes back to show the ramifications of this work on the big picture.
This image also applies to the concept of targeting an audience. Generally, at the beginning and ending of a scientific presentation, you give comments that address everyone in the room (technical and non-technical members). The middle is often more technical, although you may very well try to help those not familiar with the definitions and background information. (CSP, pages 55-60)

8. Beginnings prepare the audience for the work to be presented
Defines work
Work = A + B
Shows importance
Maps presentation A B C D
Gives background
This slide shows the kinds of information that the “Introduction” of a scientific presentation typically addresses. Often I ask the students what things they want to know when they are first introduced to a topic. The analogy I use is that an introduction section is a bus ride to a place where the readers will learn something. I ask the students to imagine that I am leading them out the door to a parked bus that will take them some place where they will learn something. I then ask what questions they have as they are walking out the door. The students will mention the first two aspects right off (“what topic are we going to learn about?” and “why is that topic important?”) and usually after prodding will state the fourth one (“how long will this trip take?” or “will we come back in time for our next class?”). Although they rarely guess the third aspect (“what information do I need to know to understand this subject?”), the third aspect makes sense to them because they usually associate background information with introductions.
I mention to the students that the fourth aspect (mapping the presentation) is more important in a presentation than in a document because the audience has no idea what direction the speaker is going unless the speaker divulges that information--at least, in a document, the readers can look at the forthcoming headings and subheadings. Moreover, in a presentation, the audience has to pace themselves--listening is hard work--and if the audience doesn’t know where they are, they become tired much more easily. (CSP, pages 66-78)

9. The middle presents the work in a logical order
pre-combustion methods
This slide is a trigger for the discussion about how to organize the middle of a scientific presentation. The body of the slide shows a common way to organize information: breakdown of the topic into parallel parts. There are certainly other logical organizations: time, position, or cause and effect. Almost all of these come down, though, to dividing the middle of the talk into sections.
The most important points for the students to understand about organizing the middle are that those divisions should be logical and that there should not be too many divisions. For instance, the example presentation reflected in the body of this slide is about five different methods for reducing sulfur dioxide emissions from coal-fired utilities. Rather than confront the audience with all five methods up front (and probably intimidate the audience at that point), the speaker wisely chose to group the methods into three parallel divisions. Groupings of two, three, and four work well in a technical presentation. Groupings of five, six, seven, or more usually intimidate the audience. Moreover, with large numbers of divisions, the audience will probably not remember all the names of the divisions.
Note that the body of this slide was used in a mapping slide for the presentation. While most speakers just give the audience a vertical list (and usually include the names “Introduction” and “Conclusion”) for the mapping slide, this speaker couched the list in an image, which is much easier to remember. In regards to the names “Introduction” and “Conclusion,” every talk has those sections, and the names are not missed. (CSP, pages 55-59, 74-75)
combustion
methods
post-combustion
methods

10. In the middle, you make smooth transitions between major points
pre-combustion
methods
combustion
post-combustion
methods
combustion
Besides finding a logical organization for the topic in presentation’s middle, the speaker also should concentrate on making smooth transitions between the divisions of those topics. How does a speaker make a smooth transition? (I usually pose this question to the students.) One way is through speech. That concludes what I have to say about pre-combustion methods. Now I will discuss combustion methods. Another way is through delivery: a pause, for example. Yet a third way is through the slides. By having at least one slide for each major division of the middle, the speaker showing that slide’s headline can signal a change in topic. Often good speakers use more than one of these clues that the talk has moved from one section to another.
In addition to transitions between the divisions of the middle, the speaker should clearly make a transition between the presentation’s beginning and its middle and between the presentation’s middle and its conclusion. The last transition is particularly important. Many students hurry through the ending and in so doing miss one of the best opportunities to emphasize information. When an audience knows that the ending of the presentation is approaching, they often sit up and concentrate (even if they have gotten lost in the technical details of the middle). The speaker should capitalize on that prospect of increased concentration by making sure that the audience knows that the ending has arrived. (CSP, pages 83-88)

11. The ending summarizes main points and places those results in the context of the big picture
Summary
That concludes what I wanted to say about the middle of presentations. Now I will discuss a presentation’s ending. In the ending of a presentation, the speakers want to accomplish two things: give a summary of the most important details and provide a big-picture perspective. Many students have a fear of repeating details. Perhaps they confuse repetition for redundancy (a needless repetition such as “bright green in color”). I usually ask them to imagine a technical course in which there was no repetition. In such a course there would be no help sessions or classes in which review was done. For each type of problem, the teacher would work through only one example.
Repetition is important in scientific writing and in scientific speaking. After all, on average, people remember only about 10 percent of what they hear. For that reason, at the end of a scientific presentation, the speaker should repeat the most important points so that the audience is more likely to walk out the door with those points.
In addition to a summary, the speaker should give a big-picture perspective on the work. In some presentations, that perspective might be a discussion of the work that needs to be done. In another presentation that perspective might be a list of recommendations. In another presentation, this perspective is a look at the technical work from the vantage point of the big picture discussed at the beginning of the talk. Each of these perspectives provide closure for the presentation. (CSP, pages 64-65, 88-91)
Big Picture