Building Vocabulary for Reading and Speaking

In oral presentations, a signpost is a word or phrase that speakers use to guide their audience through a presentation. This word or phrase acts like a sign on a road to help listeners know what will happen in the presentation or to remind listeners about what has already happened.

Introducing oneself and topic

• Hi everyone, I'm...
• Good morning/afternoon/evening. My name is...
• The topic of my talk is...
• I'm going to talk about...

Providing an outline

• Let me give you a brief overview of my talk.
• The presentation is divided into X sections.
• First of all... Next... Finally...

Introducing a topic

• To begin...
• Let’s start off by...
• The first point I/we would like to discuss is...

Concluding a topic

• I’ve/We’ve talked about...
• Having discussed...
• With that said...

Transitioning from one section or topic to another

• Next, I'd like to discuss...
• Let's move on to...
• This leads to my next point, which is...
• Now, let's turn to...

Giving examples or going into detail

• For example/instance...
• To give you an example...
• Expanding on that idea...
• I want to talk more in depth about...

Directing attention to visuals

• Take a look at...
• Please direct your attention to the...
• As you can see here...

Summarizing a section or topic

• In summary...
• To summarize...
• To recap...

Concluding a presentation

• In conclusion...
• To finish...
• To sum up this presentation...

Inviting questions

• Does anyone have any questions?
• I’m/We're happy to answer any questions at this time.