This document provides tips for creating effective presentations. It recommends grabbing the audience's attention visually and using design elements that aid recall like simple, distinctive slides in a non-linear structure. Font choice, image placement, infographics, and avoiding generic templates can improve presentation quality while keeping the content concise and easy to understand. Color, graphics, and movement are suggested to engage audiences more than walls of text.
3. Memory Good presentations aid recall – the ability to retrieve something from memory. It’s important to get the visual element right. Grab the attention of your audience not just by what you say, but how you show it.
5. Fonts say it all Classic, formal Times Clean, modern Arial Stylish, reflective Calibri Babyish, playful Comic
6. Position is everything Many presentations will be given in a very liner structure – we try to stay away from this. This can be tiresome, because its been seen and done on countless presentations. The mind cannot remember one slide to the next – there is nothing distinctive about it. It can take up to much room. People would rather listen than read. You might as well write nothing.
7. Change of position Move your text to the right Also, put any supplementary text underneath your main point in a different colour
8. Alternative Words Budget Rome hotel Budget Rome accommodation Budget Rome “Bed and Breakfast” Budget Rome guesthouse
9. Use graphics Not every Librarianwill wear glasses Simple Bizarre Memorable
11. Templates Generic templates can look really ugly. They can give the impression that you’ve not put any effort in. Many of your audiences will have seen them time and time again.
I was reflecting back on all the presentations I done and also seen, as both a professional librarian and as a member of the audience.Don’t think I ever remembered an individual slide
So in this presentation, I will quickly talk about some practical techniques you can use to make your presentations shine through design.
PowerPoint is after all a visual aid.Therefore, its important to put the effort into getting the visual element right, particularly where your students are visual learners.You want to grab the attention in every aspect of your communication.How you say it is as important as how you show it.
I consider this to be the most memorable of all our Infoskills Slides, because its simple, and communicates the idea well, and it sticks in your mind.Sometimes the simplest of slides can be the most effective.The first rule of thumb is KIS: Keep it simple
The font you choose to use can say it all – they set the tone of the presentation.As librarians, one of our concerns is that students are finding credible information.So font then is actually quite important. The top three of these, for example, clearly shout out take me serious. Where as the this one, at the bottom doesn’t.The important thing to keep in mind is to use Microsoft Office safe font – in this case you can be sure that they will appear wherever you are giving the presentation.
Many presentations will have a liner structure, like the above.And for some of the time you do need to do this, because it will be called for.However, after your 6th slide it can become tiresome - the mind will begin to forget one slide to the next.It can take up to much room.
For simple points that don’t require lots of text, you could do something like this.Make the point in a bold colour that stands out and add any supplementary text underneath in a slightly lighter colour or font size.
Example of InfoSkills sessions slide
Graphics take make things stand out in peoples minds.A simple or even bizarre graphic with accompanying points can help people log this information the memory.Images of people are more memorable than objects.People associate pictures with text much more easily, than just text on their own.
Infograhics is information that has been turned into graphics or at least part graphics.Particularly useful for statistical information.
Templates that Microsoft provides.Some of them can be really unattractive or just uninteresting.I know that many of my students will have been shown the same template over and over by lecturers.
Instead you could just use a solid colour, and vary the text colour and font
Text on a graphic. The point gets across in an appealing way. The important thing to remember is make sure the text can be seen.
You can help keep things corporate, by using a standard color or a logo.