PowerPoint for Windows training
Find out how to set up, animate and present your PowerPoint, including slides & layout, text & tables, pictures & graphics.
Download a customisable template
Microsoft offers a number of customisable PowerPoint design templates for download.
Purpose of an oral presentation
An oral presentation assignment requires you to prepare a talk or lead a discussion live in class. You may also be required to create a PowerPoint to accompany your oral presentation and to answer questions from your audience at the end of your talk.
Oral presentation checklist
State your ideas simply and clearly, without jargon
The listener of an oral presentation only has 1 opportunity to understand your point of view.
In preparing your talk, only write as much as you can say in the allocated time schedule
A good guide is 125 words per minute. For example, if you are speaking for 10 minutes then your talk should be about 1250 words long.
Structure your talk
For example:
- Talk through your ideas in chronological or historical format.
- Discuss your points step-by-step, in a procedural structure.
- Group similar ideas together under different themes and present each of these themes in order of priority, depending on the focus of your talk.
- Structure your talk in the same way as an essay – introduce your main points and tell your audience what you will be talking about, put the detail supporting your main points in the body of the presentation, then sum up your main points at the end.
Remember to prepare the listener for what section of your talk is coming up next
Use phrases like:
- “Having covered the first two central points, I'll now turn to look at the third”
- "The final issue to cover is situational dependency, which I will look at now.”
Avoid conjunctions, like “therefore”, “however”, and “additionally”
When spoken aloud, conjunctions can make your talk sound artificial and staged. Instead, try to use simple phrases like “the next point to focus on”, or “but this isn't always the case”.
It is okay to use contractions like “I'll”, “doesn't”, etc. These enhance the flow and help to naturalise your speech.
Don't just read your presentation
Aim to give the presentation using just a few bullet points to remind you of the main points. If you are using PowerPoint, you can use the notes section for this. If you practice doing this a lot, you'll find it is easier than it sounds.
Make eye contact with your audience
At the end of the talk, summarise what you have covered
Give a brief description of each theme or step you outlined.
PowerPoint presentation
In some cases, you will be asked to submit a PowerPoint as part of the oral presentation assignment. Read your assignment instructions carefully, as what you are asked to include in the PowerPoint can vary widely.
- Keep the text on the slides to a minimum.
- Keep the number of slides to a minimum.
- If you include references, put in-text citations in the slides where you cite the information and include a reference list at the end.
- Learn how to navigate the slides and add presenter's notes.
