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Powerpoint Guidelines
- Your group presentation in CS493 is an important means of exchanging
information with your fellow students. The guidelines provided here will
make your presentation as effective as possible!
- Use Powerpoint
ALL presentations should be prepared using Microsoft Powerpoint
(available in
the Chapman Lab) and will be posted on the course website. The
computer projection unit will be used to deliver the class presentations.
- Plan Your Talk
The time allotment for each talk is 30 minutes. Your
instructor is charged with the responsibility of not allowing you to
go over this time, since doing so would infringe upon someone else's
well prepared talk. Since people have other classes to attend, time
extensions are not possible. Plan your talk for 25 minutes, allowing 5
minutes for questions. Additionally, you should plan for approximately
1 minute per slide/overhead that you use for your talk. It's recommended
that you plan for approximately 24 slides as a maximum. You should
also have one viewgraph/slide that includes your talk title, your
group name, and the members of your group. This should be your
opening viewgraph.
- Organize Content
Using your outline as a guide, decide how many slides to make for each
topic. Organize the content of your slides to summarize the main points.
Know the main point(s) for each slide before you prepare it.
- Summarize Main Points
Do NOT write in complete sentences. Most people can read
faster than you can speak. Reading your slides to the audience is
guaranteed to put them to sleep. Use the slides as memory aids to help you
organize the main points and then fill in the details during your talk.
- Practice Makes Perfect
Due to the tight time constraints, it is extremely important that you
practice delivering your presentation and time it to see how long it
takes. Adjust the content accordingly while practicing to fill the
time allotment.
- Be Prepared!
Do NOT talk about any topic unless you have prepared a slide to
go with it.
DO talk about every slide you show. There is an ideal balance between
including too much and too little information on each slide. It is desireable
for the slides to require some explanation in order to hold the interest
of the audience. Too much verbal explanation leads to confusing "hand
waving" which the listeners will not remember.
- Layout and Fonts
In order for viewgraphs to be legible from the back of the room, use
large (16-18pt), well-spaced type and allow space for the border around the
image. The maximum number of lines on your viewgraph or slide should
be around 10 lines of text. As noted above, summarize and do NOT
photocopy text passages from references.
- Print Reduced Handouts
Please bring a copy of your viewgraphs, reduced and printed 6 per page,
to the instructor's office at least 2 hours prior to class time to allow
time to make copies for the class. This is a good way to provide
paper copies for taking notes and still minimize paper usage.
- Save and Backup Files
Finally, save your work frequently while working in Powerpoint and
make a backup copy on a diskette to prevent losing your work.
- Sample Presentations
The following powerpoint presentations are provided as typical examples
of student work. They are neither the best nor the worst presentations, but
are representative of the content and format that are expected. Note that
the length of these presentations may not be the same as for your presentation
and the number of slides must be adjusted accordingly.
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CS 493 Class Account
Wed Nov 19 11:34:18 AST 2003