How are effective presentations planned and delivered?

NL-ENG.K-12.4 COMMUNICATION SKILLS
Students adjust their use of spoken, written, and visual language (e.g., conventions, style, vocabulary) to communicate effectively with a variety of audiences and for different purposes.

Concepts

• Presentation
• Talking points

Principles

• The most important aspect of delivering an effective presentation is knowing the subject material very well.
• Questions are an effective way to get an audience engaged in a presentation.
• The more times one runs through a presentation (writing it out, practicing it, or delivering it to different audiences) the better it will be.

Skills

• Preparing for a slide show presentation
• Delivering a slide show presentation

Students work to gather and share knowledge that supports the well-being of their community.

Students encourage other community members to engage in practices that contribute to the well-being of their community.

Make enough copies of the Checklist for Effective Earth+ Presentation Delivery for each student. (Download here)

Orient students to the objectives of this lesson and review the basic elements of the Performance Task. In so doing, guide students to understand that a "presentation" is "a talk given to a group in order to give them information about something and/or to persuade them to agree with a point of view or to act in certain ways". Talk about examples of this definition of presentation until you are sure that this concept is understood.

You may wish to also tell students that there is another definition of "presentation": "something that is presented to an audience", as, for example, a film or slide show. Explain that it is the former type of presentation that you will be talking about in this lesson, and that in another lesson they will learn how to create effective slide shows.

Have students respond individually to this prompt, in writing:

• Think of a teacher that does a good job of making presentations. What is it about the way that teacher makes presentations that you think is effective?

Have students work in pairs to respond in writing to this prompt:

• Thinking about the list we have made and your experiences as students, list the qualities of ineffective presentations.

Discuss responses and make a list of these on the board.

Tell students that you are going to show them a few minutes of a very well-known presentation, and you want them to make notes as they watch regarding what they think is effective and not effective about that presentation. Then show them a 5-minute segment from An Inconvenient Truth.

Discuss what was effective and ineffective about the presentation. Modify the lists you have made based on this discussion.

Deliver the Composting is Easy presentation to students.

Again, ask students to describe was effective and ineffective, and record what they say.

Distribute the Checklist for Effective Earth+ Presentation Delivery, and review it with students. Discuss whether or not you would add any items to the checklist based on what you have talked about in class today, and have students write in on their copies any additions that the class as a whole decides to make. Tell students to keep these checklists, since they will be using them.

Make enough copies of the handout Tips for Delivering an Effective Earth+ Presentation for each student. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the handout Earth+ Talking Points Worksheet for each pair of students. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the handout Earth+ Talking Points Worksheet Example for each pair of students. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the handout Earth+ Marketing Worksheet for each pair of students. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the Composting is Easy slide handouts for each student. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the Green Ambassador Presentation Worksheet for each student. (Download here)

Make enough copies of the Green Ambassador Presentation Worksheet Example for each student. (Download here)

Have students respond to this prompt individually, in writing:

• What message do we want to deliver to our audience about composting?

List these talking points on the board

• Compost is good for the earth
• Compost saves you money
• Compost is easy

Point out that it is important to think about what the audience would need to know in order to understand each talking point. For example, the first talking point is "Compost is good for the earth", but the audience needs to know what compost is in order to understand that, so you would want to explain what compost is in the part of your presentation that communicates talking point.

Go through the slide show, asking students to tell you which talking point each slide discusses.

Distribute the handouts Earth+ Talking Points Worksheet and Earth+ Talking Points Worksheet Example. Ensure that students understand the relationship between the main message of a presentation, the talking points, and the support for the talking points.

Have students work in pairs to fill out the Earth+ Marketing Worksheet for the composting presentation, then compare their worksheets in their working groups so as to produce one worksheet per group. Share out some of this work.

Distribute the handout Tips for Delivering an Effective Earth+ Presentation. Review each point with the class.

Distribute the handouts Green Ambassador Presentation Worksheet and Green Ambassador Presentation Worksheet Example. Review these with the class.

• What are the qualities of an effective presenter?

Briefly share out some of the responses.

The other table group members each evaluate the presenter, using the checklist that was developed on the first day of the lesson, and making comments on the back of that sheet. They should put their names on the checklists. The presenter collects these.

Repeat this procedure until all students have presented.

Students make arrangements to deliver the Composting is Easy presentation to a new audience, as described in the Performance Task for this lesson.