Seminar: Putting It Together

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Choosing Your Topic

Searching Literature

Putting It Together

Presenter's Checklist

Presentation Scoring

MVP Awards

The MFAT

Biology Seminar
@
Harding University

Putting Your Seminar Together

Deadlines and Submission Requirements

In addition to selecting an advisor (12 weeks prior to presentation date), securing an approved Seminar Topic Proposal (8 weeks prior to presentation date), and meeting regularly with your advisor, you must distribute printed copies of your (1) Abstract, (2) Literature Cited, (3) an Evaluation Form, and (4) Presentation Summary to each faculty member no later than Monday, one week prior to your presentation date. Your submitted materials cannot be altered after being distributed to the faculty. Download a copy of the Timeline and Submission Deadlines .

The Presentation Summary is a new requirement as of Fall 2008. It will aid you in organizing your seminar in a manner easily followed by your audience. It will also assist the faculty in preparing for your seminar presenation. You should be aware that the summary will be scored on the Evaluation Form . Details of the required format and content are available at Presentation Summary Guidelines .

Planning Your Seminar Organization

As you plan your presentation, refer to the Presentation Summary Guidelines for a basic approach to arranging your presentation. A well organized scientific seminar should contain slides that accomplish the following:

introduce the topic and pose the question to be addressed during the presentation
describe how the question was tested and the methods of data collection
present data in the form of tables and/or graphs
state the conclusions

Some General Points

Getting your hands on needed articles can take a substantial portion of your preparation time. So don’t procrastinate securing your articles!
Your Seminar must be presented using Microsoft Power Point.
Your seminar should be no shorter than 15min and absolutely no longer than 18min. You will be asked to sit down before finishing if you exceed 18min.
You must define terms and techniques to which senior BIOL and BCMB majors have not likely been introduced in BIOL 254, 259, or 315.
Always move forward in the sequence of slides during a presentation; never backward. If you want to to show a slide more than once have a duplicate of the slide in the appropriate place.
When referring to a species remember that generic names begin in upper case, specific names in lower case, and both must be italicized.
Remember: 1) the word “data” is plural, 2) “acknowledgments” is easily misspelled, 3) and two words often misused are “effect” (usually a noun) and “affect” (usually a verb).
An “Acknowledgments” slide is appreciated by all but is unnecessary, especially if it causes you to hurry through your conclusions because it cuts into your allotted time.

Preparing Title, Abstract, and Literature Cited

On Monday, one week before your Seminar, you are to distribute printed copies of your (1) Abstract, (2) Literature Cited, and (3) an Evaluation Form to each faculty member, currently there are ten (10). Your Title, Abstract, and Literature Cited cannot be altered after being distributed to the faculty.

A title is specific, informative, and composed of the fewest words possible to adequately form a single coherent concept related to the content of the paper. It should inform the reader what, where, when, and on which species or group (if relevant) the research was conducted. It should not be a sentence, brief abstract, subtitle, hanging statement, or question (Carraway, L.N. 2006. Improve scientific writing and avoid perishing. American Midland Naturalist 155:383-394).

An abstract should concisely and accurately summarize your talk. It should include the question, general methodology, general quantitative results, and conclusions. Do not cite articles in your abstract.

Minimally, your literature cited must contain at least five references, with four being primary literature. You cannot cite a paper that you have not personally read. You must present data from at least three (3) of the cited articles. The number of references you should cite in your presentation should be the minimum needed to accomplish your purpose.

Both the Abstract and Literature Cited should be double-spaced and in Times Roman 12-pt font. Use the name-year method of literature citation in a format specified by either the journal Cell or Ecology.

Preparing Your Visual Aids

It is important to remember the fundamental difference between looking at information on a printed page and seeing information projected on a screen. When looking at a printed page, the reader is able to study the information for as long as desired. When seeing projected information, the reader is limited to the time the speaker allows. Therefore, it is essential that projected slides contain only as much information as the audience can reasonably assimilate in the time the speaker allows. The following is a list of Do's and Don'ts that you should put to action when preparing your seminar.

Visual aids are meant to clearly and concisely present information. Beautiful slide appearance will not substitute for weak content in graphs, tables, or talk as a whole.
Use a high contrast light text on a dark background. Keep the background simple to not detract from the message.
Avoid backgrounds that interfere with reading information projected in a table or a graph.
Slide text should be clear, legible, and large enough font to be seen easily from any part of the seminar room. Simple, block-style fonts are easiest to read (e.g., Arial).
Each slide should be integrated into your talk and support a particular statement. Know beforehand what you are going to say about each slide and omit unnecessary slides.
Avoid complete sentences except for question and conclusion slides. Minimize the amount of text on a slide by using keywords and concise phrases. If any word on a slide is not absolutely necessary, get rid of it!
A very common error is projecting too much text or too much data with too many slides during the course of a talk. It is much better to discuss a smaller amount of data thoroughly than to cover a larger amount casually.
Projected spelling, grammatical, and technical errors are embarrassing. Don't let it happen to you! Use a spell check program.
Avoid projecting information you do not intend the audience to read; such as complex legends to figures and table columns or rows that you will not address.
Present data in text, table, or graph format, but do not duplicate the same data in more than one format unless doing so allows new information to be gained.
Do not use tables scanned directly from a printed publication. Instead, remake it and edit out information that you will not address in your talk. Projected tables should usually contain no more than about 15 cells (e.g., 3 row x 5 column table).
A title above a table or graph is a good way to focus the audience's attention. If you use an optional title, make sure it is descriptive, concise, and in large print.
Do not title a slide with a literature citation.

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Maintained by J. M. Goy - Questions or Comments? jmgoy@harding.edu