How to plan a presentation

Oral presentations are means of integrating students’ language skills. Any oral
presentation prepares students for their future jobs, since an oral presentation is a
marketable skill.

Here are the steps to be considered:

1. Identify the purpose of your presentation: a – is it to inform, persuade, demonstrate? b –

do you aim to get a feedback from your audience or share your ideas with them?

2. Considering the audience: a – what do they already know about the subject/particular
subject? b – what do they benefit from it? c – how your presentation will affect them?

3. Organizing the structure:

Introduction:

You can begin by briefly saying a few words about what you are going to speak about (you
may give them a map route or a piece of paper with the headings of your presentation);

Use an opening attention grabber: a shocking picture or a quotation.

Main Body:

Give details of your topic in a logical, linking order;

Each paragraph/section should present a particular point of the presentation;

Give examples to illustrate your ideas;

Sign-post between the sections (paragraphs) to indicate the sequence of your presentation
(a picture; a concluding phrase).

Conclusion:

Summarize and highlight your main points;

Ask for questions

Example: Presentation topic My relationship with a town

Objective: to integrate the language skills acquired through the semester into
an organized structure.

1. Mind that each of the students will discuss a particular town and so, there
will be a variation in the choice of vocabulary and language patterns.
 2. Students should make clear from the beginning WHAT they are going to
comment upon and WHY they have made that choice. Their choice is between
an overall description of a town (reasons why you chose that particular town) or just
a neighbourhood from that town – you have to make that clear from the beginning).

3. Students should decide on those features that particularize the town of their
choice (architecture, atmosphere – sounds, smells -) and adapt the vocabulary to
them. Moreover, students should think about the time frame they refer to and the
tenses/aspects should be used accordingly.

4. Students should address their colleagues and ask for a response (questions,
opinions).

5. Students can interact with their colleagues during the presentation by

appealing to various techniques:

-a piece of paper containing the headlines of their presentation (title; introduction;

points of the body) and given to their colleagues;

-direct questions or commented slides.

Students can either memorize their own presentations or have a piece of

paper with the main points of their presentation as backup.