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How to Give a Talk. Why Listen?. People fear public speaking You will speak for class, work, thesis defense Another skill to learn Enjoy! “Why me?” -- A victim of dismal talks. Main Messages. Giving a talk is like ... Know your audience Start with message audience will receive
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Why Listen? • People fear public speaking • You will speak • for class, work, thesis defense • Another skill to learn • Enjoy! • “Why me?” -- A victim of dismal talks
Main Messages • Giving a talk is like ... • Know your audience • Start with message audience will receive • Prepare a topic tree • Know common mistakes
Giving a Talk is Like ... • Stuff you already know… planning, program design, writing, teaching, learning … • Can read books • “Preparing Instructional Objectives” by Mager • “Handbook of Technical Writing” by Brusaw • “The Elements of Style” by Strunk and White • ... • But you need skills
Know Your Audience • What do they know/believe? • talk at the right level • use the right means • They will be mixed • so deal with it! • Interest • inform • persuade -- change • expose a structure
Messages!!! • You must have messages • They are the destination • A few, not many • plan supporting sub-messages • Do not plan outward from you, but backward from them
Messages • “I have too little to say” • bah • “I don’t have enough time” • “… then I did this and then I did that…”
Topic Tree • Like program design • Display it any way that works • Depth depends on audience • don’t preach to the choir • Practice!! • How long will it take? • Prune • Remove deadly details [major limb pruned here]
Topic Order • State messages early • Decide precedence after content • Talk’s order is not necessarily the order of planning the talk
Avoiding Misstakes (proff read) • Timing • Tension • Tedium • Techniques
Common Mistake - Timing • Prune during timed practice • “cram” implies you aren’t focusing on them • Be aware of time • Too much intro!! • Plan for disaster • “eeek” doesn’t impress • If behind, don’t talk faster • they cannot listen faster
Common Mistake - Timing • Set a pace for them not you • First few minutes • why should they listen? • why should they believe you? • Finish • impress main messages • don’t gasp or get tossed off the stage
Common Mistake - Tension • The audience is on your side • they want you to succeed • look at them during the talk • Butterflies are normal and good • Plan, prune and practice so you can relax • Messages • Focus on audience not you
Common Mistake - Tedium • Are you enjoying it? • Are you interested in them? • Occasional witticism is good • A cartoon ... • Monotone!!! • Interact with them • Messages are the key
Techniques • Speed bumps • Don’t kill interest with detail • No preemptive apology • Talk tool - Powerpoint
Slides • Informs them and focuses you • Use slides • Not “busy” • Size • Don’t write what you will say • Transitions • Physical movement of slides • Know what you will say
Good terse phrases bullets highlight key points graphs pictures Bad verbose compound sentences paragraphs unlabelled graphs tables of numbers Slides • Revise, revise, revise!
Slides • Complex figures are ok • spend time • describe axes, then trendlines, then resutls • point to spots • Tell them what to get from the figure!
Summary • Messages • Audience • Backwards • Topic Tree • Plan, prune, practice • Enjoy
Project 3 (1 of 3) • 15 Minutes total • Plan on 12 minutes of material • Time for questions/shuffling • About 1.5-2 minutes per slide on average • Some faster, some slower • Practice for flow and timing • Out loud. • You can think faster than you can talk • You can do about 3 in an hour • It will make a big difference
Project 3 (2 of 3) • 1 major message per slide • e.g. don't combine intuition, motivation problem and solution all in one. • Be consistent with titles to help audience • "Motivation" should not talk about methods • "My algorithm“ should not summarize related work • Your talk as advertisement • Not all the details of what you did • But give flavor or highlight difficulties
Project 3 (3 of 3) • Start from high level and then go into detail • Tell people exactly what you are trying to say • Audience - level of class similar to yours • Graduate level CS students • Some experience in multimedia • May not know details on your problem, tho • Have fun! • If you enjoy your work, audience will, too
Project 3 – Possible Structure • Title: 1 slide • What is the problem: 1 slide • Motivation/Importance: 1 slide • What is the solution/contribution: 1 slide • (Background/Definitions/Previous Work: 1 slide) • Approach/Work/Implementation: 1-3 slides • Experiment design: 1 slide • Results: 1-3 slides • Conclusions and Future work: 1 slide