Present Like a Pro

• Planning your presentation can help ensure that only relevant content is included.
• A good plan will ensure your presentation flows well and has a strong introduction and conclusion.
• Planning your presentation and starting well before the due date will allow time to practice, get feedback, revise your content, and polish your skills before your presentation in class.

• Consider other academic presentations that you’ve seen before. What did you like about them? Can you incorporate something similar into your presentation?
• Consult your course outline to determine the specific criteria for the presentation.
• Determine the purpose of the presentation (to inform, teach, discuss, convince, or demonstrate your knowledge, etc.).
• Check how much time you have to present.
• Establish who your audience is and consider how familiar they will be with the subject matter of your presentation. Check out Seven Questions to Know Your Audience for more information.
• Determine how marks will be allocated for the presentation. If a rubric has been provided, review it frequently to ensure you’re meeting the project requirements. 
• Keep purpose and audience in mind as you gather information for your presentation. 
• Academic presentations are considered a form of academic publication and must be referenced appropriately. (For information on referencing, consult the appropriate citation guide for your discipline.)

• Check your course outline to see if any guidelines have been provided about the structure of your presentation.
• Presentations usually have three basic sections: the opening, the body, and the conclusion.

Opening

• Start your presentation by introducing the topic and establishing its relevance to the course.
• It can be helpful to use a “hook” in your opening to grab the audience’s attention. You could use a relevant statistic, a provocative question or prediction, a compelling anecdote, an image, a surprising fact, etc. Always be cautious with humour – be sure it’s appropriate for an academic context.
• You may also consider starting with an outline of your presentation, and/or providing learning outcomes to help your audience know what to expect.

Body

• The body of the presentation can be organized if different ways:
  • chronological
  • topical grouping
  • question and answer
  • narrative (as a story), or
  • journal article format.
• Choose a method that makes the most sense for your topic, the goal of your presentation, and your audience.
• The main ideas in your presentation should flow logically from one idea to the next.

Conclusion

• Conclude your presentation with one or more main ideas that the audience should take away.
• You may also consider leaving your audience with an actionable take-away (i.e. what is something that they now should do?) or a question to think about.

• Think of potential questions before your presentation.
• When practicing your presentation, ask your audience to suggest possible questions.
• Pay attention to the questions that your instructor asks other presenters, and prepare for those types of question or level of detail.
• If you expect many questions from your audience, create slides with additional information from your research. Place the slides at the end of your presentation, and use them if a relevant question is asked.