Join me, Rachel Robinson (University of Leeds, UK), to talk about how to help students develop strategies for giving more effective presentations as part of the Academic ELT Online Conference, on Thursday 31 October at 12.00 GMT.
Students often find giving a presentation something of a challenge, and can be overwhelmed at the prospect of presenting in a language other than their mother tongue. Considering the high stakes of their academic courses, clearly it would be of benefit to them to be equipped to meet this challenge and given the opportunity to develop strategies and practise their presentation skills long before they reach the assessment stage.
On academic English courses there can be an emphasis on developing writing skills. Students are often encouraged to work through the process of producing a piece of academic writing which has been planned, organised, drafted, redrafted, and proofread before final submission for grading. Many students believe that the presentation is an ‘easier’ exercise because it does not involve such detailed preparation and large amounts of written work in English.
Not fully understanding the power of a good performance based on solid preparation, careful selection of content and practising their talk in advance results in a badly organized presentation. This may include slides filled with large chunks of text and quotes from other sources together with images which look interesting but may not always be relevant. In terms of delivery, failure to practise their talk in advance leads to a presentation that is far too short or conversely, overlength. Both of which mean loss of marks in their assessment.
So what is the webinar focus?
This webinar will focus on identifying the key skills students need to acquire in order to give a polished presentation, whether for academic or non-academic purposes, and the strategies that they and their teachers can employ to develop these skills.
In this talk, I will highlight how students can be guided in the use of technology to aid them in dealing with timing issues and use of images for added impact. I will provide examples of short tasks and activities for use in a variety of classroom scenarios, together with some general tips which could be applied to different teaching contexts. These include building in peer review activities to help students become more independent learners.
Find out more and register now to join a series of free webinars as part of our online conference designed for teachers of academic English.