Two learning outcomes for this semester in Health Psychology were to be able to critically evaluate and identify implications in published psychology research, as well as to create and deliver a professional presentation using current psychology research. Students were divided into groups of four or five and prepared a presentation to demonstrate that they were able to accomplish these learning outcomes. The groups were able to choose their own topic, as long as it encompassed a health behavior. Students then researched their topic and critiqued it during their presentation.
There are many aspects of a presentation that make it great. In my opinion, the three most important components are content, time management, and professionalism.
Since these presentations challenged students to evaluate published psychology research, it was key that all statements were backed by research. In most cases, the presentations appeared to be driven by research. However, in one particular case, I am not positive the research used was appropriate. To assure the audience that what a group is saying is verifiable, groups need to provide not only the results, but also methods, variables, sample sizes, et cetera. When in doubt, show the data (and explain it).
Secondly, time management is a skill that will be used long after graduation from college. Time management is easy to attain with a well-practiced presentation. This component is vital to the presentation as it also leads to a comprehensive flow, assures appropriate time spent on slides, and aids in keeping the attention of the audience. The majority of students never exceeded the allotted time of 20 minutes. However, time management also includes that you do not stop it too short. Most of the presentations ended well below this time. This could have easily been fixed by spending more time as a group practicing the presentation. Additionally, stopping a presentation short can lead to assumptions that the topic was not well researched.
Lastly, and probably the most interesting, is professional attire during a presentation. If randomly asked if jeans are appropriate to wear during a professional presentation, most individuals would answer, ‘No”. Ironically, numerous students were wearing jeans, even after being told to be professionally dressed. Multiple aspects of this topic interest me. First, is “dress professional” subjective? Is the sweatpants-wearing student dressed professionally if he or she presents in jeans and a button-down collared shirt? Perhaps we need to reiterate what professional attire means. However, students commented on their peers’ choice of clothing on their individual comment cards, making the issue a bit paradoxical. If students are commenting on clothing, they must know jeans, for example, are not appropriate.
One additional thing I think all students could work on is the oral delivery of a presentation. Presentations imply that a person or a group are giving an audience new information. Teaching, therefore, is similar to a presentation. Speeches are not. Some students spoke in a monotone voice with excessively lengthy pauses between sentences. Others were dependent on note cards and made little eye contact with the audience. I think this goes back to knowing the information that is being presented. If a professor used note cards to give lectures, students would be in uproar. Students can deliver a great presentation with studying the information and practicing the presentation multiple times before presenting it.
Good points made. I think that you hit the three main points though of course, content is the biggest one. Something I need to think deeper about is how to foster and model better presentations of articles. To some extent this is something students should learn in experimental and by golly when I teach it next semester I am going to take time to train them there. They should spend more time on results and I think this was a problem across the board. IT relates to groups going under time. Those 3-4 minutes could have been used to convince the class with data. Again, I first have to ask myself what I could have done to foster that better—the rubric provided online DOES have time suggestions (my rebuttal) but what more is needed, what more can and should an instructor do?
The notes on the professional dress is also interesting. Do we really have to spell out professional (example clothing in handout)? In the rubric do we say that students will be down graded for variations from there? Maybe.
All this said, I think the groups were more prepared than i have seen in the past and I would like to attribute that to the worksheets and class time but it could be a cohort effect too.