Enhancing Teachers for Academic

Presentation: Hard and Soft Skills

A presentation for a webinar on
Unlocking Professional Avenues through Academic Skill
By
Guru Prasad Poudel,
Department of English Education,
T.U., Kirtipur
 Presentation Outline:

• Paradigm Shifts
• Academic presentations
• Hard and Soft Skills
• Designing Slides for presentation
• The issues in presentation
• Tips to enhance our academic presentations
Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 2
 Paradigm shifts
• Teacher and blackboard/white board to presenter and projector
• Audio to audio-visual
• Write and explain to display and interact
• Classroom to community

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 3

 Three basics for enhancing academic
presentations
• Willingness
• Engagement
• Involvement

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 4

What comes under academic presentations?

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 5

 Academic presentation includes:
• Conference talks
• Classroom lectures
• Research reports
• Seminar papers
• Meeting / Workshop starters

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 6

 I have no problem in admitting academic
presentations
• To be a great public speaker, it’s key to develop a personal speaking style.
Since I know I’m not the most eloquent speaker in the world, I make up
for it by packing my presentations with enthusiasm, unique/proprietary
data, and tons of useful content (Kim, 2020) arrykim #stateofsearch 
http://t.co/uttijruots

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 7

 Soft Skills: Physiology, chemistry, stress

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 Good presenters are made not born
• Transform nervous energy into enthusiasm.
• Be punctual: arrive early
• Adjust to your surroundings
• Meet and greet
• Smile
• Work on your pauses

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 Con…
• Actively engage the audience
• Be careful about language
• Bounce back from mistakes
• Use a power stance
• Mannerisms
• Body language and gestures

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 Hard Skills: Prepare, plan
and practise/rehearse
• Create a need
• Identify a few key points
• Researching the topic
• Practice: preparation is key
• Attend other presentations
• Audience analysis

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 Con…
• Use an outline
• Rehearsing lines in various positions
• Start and end strongly
• Use examples and welcome statements from the audience
• Use slides and other visual aids
• Don’t try to cover too much materials/don’t include every detail

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 Presentation modes:
Microsoft Powerpoint and Prezi

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 13

(Image Source: Microsoft.com/pcmag.com,2020)
 Basics of Powerpoint design (9 elements): Microsoft ppt.
Home, insert, design, transitions, animations, slide-show, review, view and format

Home

Insert

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 14

Design

Transitions

Animations

Guru Prasad Poudel: Academic presentation, BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 15

Slideshow

Review

View

FORMAT

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 What makes power point good and bad?

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 Paradigm Shift of Using Theory/Models
• Couples of behaviour change theories are there which explain why and how
people do/not adopt certain health behaviours.
• Initiated since 1940s and remained dominant till 1970s (Glanz & Rimer,
2005).
• Individual level theories/models emphasize on value, expectancy, motivation
and intention of people that determine the behavior (Rimer, 2005).
• Interpersonal theories/models came into existence and remained dominant till
1980s.
• Interpersonal level theories/models emphasize on cognitions, beliefs, and
behaviors within and among the individual (McAlister, Perry and Parcel, 2005).
 Behaviour
Individual theories change
emphasize on value, theories
expectancy, explain why
motivation and and how
intention that people adopt
determine the certain
behavior behaviours.

Interpersonal level
theories
emphasize on
cognitions, beliefs,
and behaviors
within and among
the individual

Paradigm shifts of using

theories
 What is wrong in this slide?
When assessing the empirical question of why one should maintain minority languages, Grin asks
both what the costs and benefits are in minority languages are maintained and promoted, and
what the costs(the benefits) are if they are neither maintained not promoted. Some of his
conclusions, which we endorse, are as follows (Grin 2003; 26);
“diversity seems to be positively, rather than negatively, correlated with welfare”;
“available evidence indicates that the monetary costs of maintaining diversity are remarkably
modest”;
“devoting resources to the protection and promotion of minority cultures”(and this includes
languages)’ “may help to stave off political crises whose costs would be considerably higher than
that of the policies considered”(namely the peace-and-security argument);

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 PowerPoint Slides

• 6 x 6 rule • Text and images

• Font type and size • Text density
• Slide design/layout • How many slides
• Slide size
• Color combination

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 Maintaining ethics and referencing in presentation

 Presenting the somebody’s

powerpoint owing on self
 Not citing the sources of the photo
 Acknowledge is a must
 Accidental/direct or complete
plagiarism

Image source: http://www.lisbdnet.com/plagiarism/)

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 The issues 1

• Scope of the message

• Presenter ambition
• Use of jargons
• Time management

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 The issues 2
• What is known and what is
new
• PowerPoint slides
• Voice and body language
• The technology

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Tips to make our presentation effective 1

• Knowing the audience and the delimiting the scope

• Ambition: what do I want to achieve?
• Choice of words and phrases: minimal jargons
• Time management: proportionate distribution
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How to make our presentation effective 2

• Balance of the known and the new

• What works best with the PowerPoint Slides
• Voice level and projection
• Using the body language appropriate to the audience
• Preparing and setting up the equipment

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 Things to consider
• Choose the style that works best for us
• Mix of data and narrative
• Less is more
• The evidence for the claims
• The credits to the authors/materials

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 Recap: Ten Commandments by David
Peterson
Be neat
Give proper space

Keep them short and sweet

Embed with picture, symbols, figures,

Keep large size of letter

Keep good combination of color

Illustrate the facts, evidence or arguments

Don’t skip slides in a long talk

Keep eye contact

Guru Prasad Poudel:Practice at once before

Academic presentation, you present
BMC Pokhara 12/12/2020 28
 Organizing presentation in a conference
• Introduction/Overview/Hook
• Theoretical Framework/Research Question
• Methodology/Case Selection
• Background/Literature Review
• Discussion of Data/Results
• Analysis
• Conclusion
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Finally

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 References
https://www4.stat.ncsu.edu/~reich/st810A/oral.pdf
https://static.thecreativefinder.com/userfiles/members/gagcartoon/11138/optimized-maxW950-st
ock_cartoon_image_0284_.
gif
https://
www.secretaressenet.nl/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/1027447_17450608-e1460916443882.jpg
Kim, H. (2020). Presentation skills (as in arrykim #stateofsearch http://t.co/uttijruots
Sapkota, A. (2020). Awareness if ICT preparatory tools: Micromanagement and way forward
( as in http://eltchoutari.com/2020/04/awareness-of-ict-preparatory-tools-micro-management-
and-way-forward/
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