XI. Presentation Strategies and Skills
Over the course of the year, you will be asked to deliver several talks about your Capstone project, culminating with your major public presentation in May. Our model for these is based on the most successful TEDx talks.
In addition, inspired by the approach of Stand & Deliver, a public speaking educational group based in California, we will begin thinking about the art of public speaking, breaking down presentations into manageable parts. The Stand & Deliver model emphasizes that all talks are structured around three key elements: the ramp (the opener), 3 points of discovery, what we call “buckets” (the middle/key evidence/content of the talk), and the dessert (the “extra”/crescendo ending).
Over the course of the year, you will be asked to deliver several talks about your Capstone project, culminating with your major public presentation in May. Our model for these is based on the most successful TEDx talks.
In addition, inspired by the approach of Stand & Deliver, a public speaking educational group based in California, we will begin thinking about the art of public speaking, breaking down presentations into manageable parts. The Stand & Deliver model emphasizes that all talks are structured around three key elements: the ramp (the opener), 3 points of discovery, what we call “buckets” (the middle/key evidence/content of the talk), and the dessert (the “extra”/crescendo ending).
This is excerpted from the book by Stand & Deliver founders Peter Meyers and Shann Nix, As We Speak: How to Make Your Point and Have it Stick (2011).
The model focuses on your content and how you structure it, as well as your delivery and how to craft that delivery to be most effective. We will work with you on building your “ramp,” clearly laying out your “buckets,” and identifying what might be your most effective “dessert.” As a group, we will use feedback forms like the one below to give you information about how your presentation is perceived by your audience.
Our hope is that this will enable you to think concretely about how to structure a presentation without reliance on other tools (think PowerPoint, Prezi, etc.). We believe that slides should enhance and punctuate your presentations, not be ones from which you read and regurgitate. You will be asked to keep slides to a minimum and come up with inventive ways to engage your audience. Your goal will be to use the tools at your disposal in order to convey what you have discovered in the course of your project work and communicate your ideas effectively to a wide audience unfamiliar with your efforts.
Over the course of the year, you will build up to this final TEDx-style presentation. Your initial videotaped proposals (due on the first day of school) are the first of these, and over the summer, you read As We Speak to get a sense of how to structure these talks. Over the subsequent months, you will do a 3 x 5 presentation (3 slides over 5 minutes), 3 x 7 presentation (3 slides over 7 minutes), a 5 x 12 presentation (5 slides over 12 minutes), culminating with the TEDx talk in May. All of these talks will be videotaped and you will have ample opportunity to review and reflect on them, as well as receive feedback from peers, teachers, and mentors. The idea is to see you get better and better at these presentations over time so that the TEDx talk is a celebration of your work on your project and your well-honed presentation skills.
Before each presentation, we will ask you to complete a communication blueprint (see Appendix J). The goal of completing this blueprint is to have you think out and explicitly identify what your ramp, three buckets, and dessert will be. The nature of these may change over time (and these blueprints will enable you to keep a record of that change). But the blueprint is a useful way to insure that you have done some deep thinking about these talks.
The presentations are evaluated using a rubric. You can find a copy of the TEDx talk rubric (which is identical to those used throughout the year on the “lead up” presentations) in Appendix J-1 of this handbook.
You will also be asked to write a reflection on your TEDx talk after you deliver it, based on reviewing the filmed version. See Appendix J-2 for the template for this reflection.
By year’s end, we are hopeful that you will be able to give not only a stellar presentation in May but will have developed lifelong skills that will enable you to deliver memorable, effective remarks in virtually any environment.
Sources: Stand & Deliver Speak to Inspire, handouts from the Capstone Consortium conference at the Thacher School in Ojai, California, June 16, 2014 and Peter Meyers and Shann Nix, As We Speak: How to Make Your Point and Have it Stick, New York: Atria, 2011.
The model focuses on your content and how you structure it, as well as your delivery and how to craft that delivery to be most effective. We will work with you on building your “ramp,” clearly laying out your “buckets,” and identifying what might be your most effective “dessert.” As a group, we will use feedback forms like the one below to give you information about how your presentation is perceived by your audience.
Our hope is that this will enable you to think concretely about how to structure a presentation without reliance on other tools (think PowerPoint, Prezi, etc.). We believe that slides should enhance and punctuate your presentations, not be ones from which you read and regurgitate. You will be asked to keep slides to a minimum and come up with inventive ways to engage your audience. Your goal will be to use the tools at your disposal in order to convey what you have discovered in the course of your project work and communicate your ideas effectively to a wide audience unfamiliar with your efforts.
Over the course of the year, you will build up to this final TEDx-style presentation. Your initial videotaped proposals (due on the first day of school) are the first of these, and over the summer, you read As We Speak to get a sense of how to structure these talks. Over the subsequent months, you will do a 3 x 5 presentation (3 slides over 5 minutes), 3 x 7 presentation (3 slides over 7 minutes), a 5 x 12 presentation (5 slides over 12 minutes), culminating with the TEDx talk in May. All of these talks will be videotaped and you will have ample opportunity to review and reflect on them, as well as receive feedback from peers, teachers, and mentors. The idea is to see you get better and better at these presentations over time so that the TEDx talk is a celebration of your work on your project and your well-honed presentation skills.
Before each presentation, we will ask you to complete a communication blueprint (see Appendix J). The goal of completing this blueprint is to have you think out and explicitly identify what your ramp, three buckets, and dessert will be. The nature of these may change over time (and these blueprints will enable you to keep a record of that change). But the blueprint is a useful way to insure that you have done some deep thinking about these talks.
The presentations are evaluated using a rubric. You can find a copy of the TEDx talk rubric (which is identical to those used throughout the year on the “lead up” presentations) in Appendix J-1 of this handbook.
You will also be asked to write a reflection on your TEDx talk after you deliver it, based on reviewing the filmed version. See Appendix J-2 for the template for this reflection.
By year’s end, we are hopeful that you will be able to give not only a stellar presentation in May but will have developed lifelong skills that will enable you to deliver memorable, effective remarks in virtually any environment.
Sources: Stand & Deliver Speak to Inspire, handouts from the Capstone Consortium conference at the Thacher School in Ojai, California, June 16, 2014 and Peter Meyers and Shann Nix, As We Speak: How to Make Your Point and Have it Stick, New York: Atria, 2011.