Working at the UCWbL, we tend to become focused on certain common types of writing assignments, such as essays or short homework assignments, like discussion posts and summaries. Which I think is fair, because it constitutes the vast majority of what we do. However, it’s important to remember that there are many different kinds of appointments that can come through the door, one of those being presentations. I know that when I had a writer come in with a presentation it threw me. Even as a business student who has done plenty of presentations, it can be difficult to translate the skills you know into tutoring.
This is because, unlike many genres of writing, presenting has a performance aspect to it. When you write a paper or turn in a homework assignment, it can already make people anxious. However, with presenting it requires the writer to be very clear, because the audience cannot reread what is being said, and there is added pressure in regards to physical presence. Therefore, because there are different aspects to presenting than other genres of writing, I wanted to break the process of tutoring for presentations down into a more simple 5-step process. I think having a frame of reference could be very helpful when conducting appointments with presenters.
1. Addressing Insecurities
I think that one of the things that’s really important to remember about presenting is that it makes people uncomfortable. According to Psychology Today, approximately 1/4th of people have a fear of public speaking. Obviously sharing writing can be really nerve wracking too, but the reason that people fear public speaking so much more is likely because presentations have a higher perceived risk. Not only are you getting up in front of a room and giving your opinion, but it can involve new ideas, you may not have very much experience, and it becomes easy to inflate the stakes in your head (Tsaousides). However, it’s important to remember that most of these risks are purely psychological, and that there is power in addressing them. It can even be worked into rapport building. Though, whichever way you do it, I think that taking the time to make the writer feel comfortable will really benefit them and your appointment moving forward.
2. Identifying the Audience
After you address your presenter’s worries, it is time to move on and think about the actual content of the presentation. Everything I’ve read has said the same thing about generating content, which is that you have to think of the audience first. Presenting is different from writing in the sense that you could write something only for yourself. However, presenting is always for an audience, and generally you are trying to convince them of something or communicate information (Duarte). This isn’t to say that presentations can’t be personal. In fact, those kinds of presentations can be very effective and powerful. That said, it’s important to keep them in mind throughout the entire process. You wouldn’t give an emotional presentation to a bunch of business executives, or a business presentation to your science class.
As you think about the audience with your writer, some important things to keep in mind are:
- Who are you presenting to?
- What is your objective/ prompt?
- How do they expect you to present yourself?
- What is their experience with your topic?
- What might be effective for communicating with them?
3. Brainstorming Ideas
You might find that in the process of considering audience, you might already start coming up with some ideas for content. Thankfully, this isn’t all that different from brainstorming in a writing appointment. In fact, I think what Flower and Hayes’ (1977) argue can be really helpful for this step. Keeping your objective in mind and the requirements of the presentation, you might consider freewriting (or free presenting), mind mapping or treeing ideas, or even acting out a scenario where you are the audience and they present you ideas or ask you questions (454). Even if they haven’t done any research yet, brainstorming can be a really good way to get an idea of what they might need to start researching or include in their project.
4. Creating an Outline
After you figure out what the writer should include in their project, it might be helpful to organize those ideas into an outline. If your writer is struggling with how everything should look, this could be really helpful for them in terms of visualizing their presentation. Again, this isn’t very different from doing an outline for any other genre. You have a cover, an introduction, a body, a conclusion, and works cited. Imagining a presentation as an oral essay can be a really helpful strategy. Overall, this step is just about getting the writer organized before they move into constructing their presentation.
One resource that I found helpful was from Princeton professors Margaret Martonosi and Iris Bahar. They put together a presentation on good presentations for a summer class that they teach. While I think that it’s valuable in its entirety, I think that their sample outline on pages 6 and 7 is a really clear model. They give headings for each section and discuss what should be included and approximately how long each section should be. I think that the way presentations look can vary greatly. However, if this is an area where you feel that more structure would be helpful for your tutoring, this is a great resource.
5. Presenting the Ideas
Finally, once you have your ideas and structure planned out, it comes down to putting everything together visually. Presentations can be tricky, because everyone seems to have a different idea of how they should look. Therefore, I tried to synthesize some of the common themes that I saw throughout my research. The three things that I came up with are keep it simple, use strong graphics, and don’t overcrowd your slides. What I mean by that is that a lot of people make presentations that they can rely on. They try to fit all of their information on a slide in bullet points and might skip out on aesthetics. However, your PowerPoint should be a visual aid that relies on you to explain it.
Therefore, there are some powerful tools that you can use in to help with the presentation. Firstly, identifying major themes or ideas can be really helpful for keeping the presentation simple. What are these ideas? How can you highlight them clearly? How can the presenter relate back to them throughout the presentation? It can also be helpful to use the rule of 3’s to highlight these ideas and to help the audience remember them. Also, depending on the presentation, it might be helpful to use very little text, and to even consider not using bullet points. If there is too much text on the slide, the audience won’t pay attention to what’s being said. If your presenter is concerned that the audience won’t be able to take notes or remember what’s said, suggesting using a handout can be a helpful way to give notes without distracting the audience. Finally, graphics and images are helpful for giving the audience something visually interesting to look at and making your slides more memorable. You want the audience to remember the presentation as aesthetically pleasing and clear.
If you have any more concerns about how a presentation should look, this HuffPost article outlines some different conventions of presentations: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/how-to-give-the-best-pres_b_3932280
References
Flower, Linda S., and John R. Hayes. “Problem-Solving Strategies and the Writing Process.” College English, vol. 39, no. 4, 1977, p. 449., doi:10.2307/375768.
Gude, Karl. “How to Give the Best Presentation You Possibly Can.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 19 Nov. 2013, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/how-to-give-the-best-pres_b_3932280.
Martonosi, Margaret and Iris Bahar. How to Give a Good Presentation. Princeton University, Aug. 2008, https://www.princeton.edu/~archss/webpdfs08/BaharMartonosi.pdf.
Duarte, Nancy. “The Secret Structure of Great Talks.” TED, TED, Nov. 2011, https://www.ted.com/talks/nancy_duarte_the_secret_structure_of_great_talks?referrer=playlist-how_to_make_a_great_presentation#t-257373.
Tsaousides, Theo. “Why Are We Scared of Public Speaking?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 27 Nov. 2017, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/smashing-the-brainblocks/201711/why-are-we-scared-public-speaking.