How to make an effective oral presentation

Learning a language is always full of excitement and challenges. Among ways of improving your language skills, making a public speech or presentation is a useful one. The following notes are my two cents worth about how to do a good job on an oral presentation.

effective 有效的
excitement 興奮, 激動
challenge 挑戰
presentation 簡報
two cents worth 觀點
oral 口說的

In order to make your topic informative and persuasive, it's a good idea to do a few research on it. Practice as much as your can before your do the real stuff.

informative 資料豐富的
persuasive 有說服力的
research 研究
practice 練習
stuff 東西

Use tools like Power point , slides, transparencies, pictures, and so forth in your presentation. These are the things called 'visual aid' that helps people understand, learn, or remember information provided from you. Besides, using visual aid can awake your audience for a monotonous topic.

Power point 微軟的簡報軟體
slide 幻燈片
transparency 投影片
and so forth 等等
visual aid 視覺輔助
provide 提供
besides 除此之外
awake 喚醒
audience 觀眾

A note card, the thing we learned from the school's presentation class, helps you remember your path or even when you have a blank during the presentation. To prepare note cards isn't like writing down everything you are going to say on it, but you have to just take down the key words or a summary of the contents broken down into several parts in your note card. During the presentation, you can hold them in your one hand and have a quick glimpse of them to remind you what you have to say next. It works well for me.

note card 提示卡
path 路徑
have a blank 一片空白
during 在...期間
take down 記下
summary 大綱
contents 內容
be broken down 分散成
several 一些
glimpse 很快的看過
remind 提醒

Body language is another important issue here. First, Eye contact! Pay attention to your audience and see their faces at times and make them believe that you are making a good presentation because you are enthusiastic about the topic. Second, tone variation. Try not to use the same tone all the time. Do not speak too fast or too slow, try not to let people know you are nervous though it happens to us very often.

issue 議題
eye contact 眼神的接觸
enthusiastic 熱心的, 真誠的
tone variation 語調變化
nervous 警張的

Last but not least, be confident. You have to trust yourself even if you are making a debut of your presentation. When it comes to the actual presentation, present your issue as if you mean it. You talk as if you mean it, the audience will be moved. You make them believe what you're saying.

last but not least 最後也是最重要的
confident 有信心的
trust 信任
debut 初次登場
actual 實際的

In a word, it sounds difficult to get ready for an oral presentation but is well the effort to prepare for it. So, good luck if you're going to do one. I hope these will come in handy for you.

In a word 總而言之
well the effort 值得努力的
come in handy 派的上用場