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today i managed to postpone one presentation, and a good thing too, because i didn't have my notes printed. without notes in hand, i am crutch-less and will have 'blank brain' causing long awkward pauses because i am unprepared and very nervous.
some people in class were able to address the audience (us) as if they were talking to a friend. they were very comfortable with communicating to us, and the ideas and explanations flowed freely from them.
amazing. it was obvious that they were passionate about their subject and knew it inside-out.
of course, there were people who were not so engaging as well.
many talked for 10+ minutes when it's supposed to be a 5 minute presentation, so out of 20+ people, 6+ (including me) have to do it next week.
yes! time to write a script.
then in another later class, the tutor tricked us into volunteering to present.
luckily, it was for tutor to give feedback, and was not graded.
anyway i thought i was off the hook because he didn't see me raise my hand at his trick question ("who has their slides with them?").
have the courage to admit that i raised my hand? no way José.
but during tutor's final call for forced volunteers, my neighbour indicated to tutor that i did bring my powerpoint slides. /betrayalllllllll
my heartbeat became very intense and unnaturally loud.
i didn't have notes to read here too so i had to speed through the thing, the awful painful act of speaking to a room of people.
i read bits of the slides off the screen, sometimes turning to face the people, but desperately trying not to notice anyone and anything.
this kind of on-the-spot summary happened at each slide, and it was terrible to click to the next slide because of the awkward conclusion of 1 slide and the awkward beginning of another.
and i found myself doing strange movements due to nervous habits like wringing hands, touching face, etc... i knew i had stand properly and not look crazy but it still happened.
i didn't care if my speed was okay, if people understood, if what i said made sense, although i know i should care.
after the last slide, tutor said some stuff about how it's not bad and how it can be improved.
okay.
... i have a presentation to do this Friday too.
zzz
2 Comments
Welcome to the whole new world of 'dog & pony shows', where the delivery is more important than the content :)
Like my mentors said: it's oftentimes not what you say, but how you say it.
So if there's one thing you want to work on, it's presentation.
that's really interesting, didn't think that anything could be more important than content.
will work on it!