Now that you have drafted a thesis statement and ranked the changes you investigated, you can begin to develop the rest of your presentation. I will be checking in with each team about specific questions related to your team’s thesis.

Presentation Development
It is time to pull everything together. Here is what you need to do next:

Part 1: Outline Presentation
You need to work as a team to write an outline of your presentation.  The outline is basically a plan for what you are going to say in the presentation and the order in which you’ll say it.  Outlining is an important step because you have several team members with different ideas to present, all leading toward one overall conclusion. Everything needs to fit together in an organized way so your points and your supporting arguments are all clear.

Any good research paper or presentation starts with your thesis, continues with a number of sections in which you’ll give your support for that thesis, and then ends with a conclusion. The outline allows you to set aside a specific place for each section you are going to include and to list some notes, showing the main points you are going to make in each section.

From your previous work, you should already have your thesis, so that part is done.  Next, you need to list the supporting sections; these will be reports of the research that each team member conducted.  Each of you will get a section in which you’ll report the highlights of your research, including the hypotheses posed, how you went about researching your answers, and your findings related to Mr. Clark's original questions. 

You’ll need to think as a team about the order of these individual parts of the presentation; the order should support the overall message you are communicating in the thesis.  For example, if you are recommending that Mr. Clark fund this research, you’ll want to lead with the most promising research points.  If you are recommending against this project, you’ll lead with the potential risks.  Finally, you'll summarize your team’s conclusion.

Please submit a copy of your team's presentation outline as soon as possible. I'll give you feedback as quickly as I can, but you should start to build your presentation in the meantime.

Part 2: Draft Presentation
The next step is to create the presentation by writing all sections in the form of slides in PowerPoint.

With your team, you need to decide on the template you all want to use (the color scheme, fonts for headers and text, etc.).  Then you need to divide the work of preparing the slides for each section of the presentation, with each team member drafting his/her individual part(s). Finally, you’ll review and revise the presentation. Do whatever you can to make the presentation logical and understandable, as your evidence will be questioned and critiqued by both your colleagues and myself, to help Mr. Clark make his final decision.

Part 3: Practice Presentation
Before you have to give your presentation to your peers, I would like you to do a practice run for me. I want to check both your presentation skills (style, tone, transitions between presenters, etc.) and, of course, the content of your presentation. Expect me to challenge you as preparation for presenting to your peers later; you’ll need to think on your feet and be ready to answer questions.

Part 4: Revise Presentation
The final step before you present is to revise your presentation content and polish your presentation style based on what you learn from the practice run. This is your final preparation before giving the presentation for real.

I look forward to seeing your outlines and to reviewing your presentations.

Best regards,

Jamie Matthews, PhD

Oligochaete: Thou taxonomic pain!
My mouth and mind and memory affirm,
'Twoud be much less a stress upon the brain
To designate you merely as a worm.
But then again, perhaps it is untrue
To brand you as too simple for your name.
For possibly, the tests we put you through
Just don't quite fit your undulating frame.
Psychologists are on the highest ground
When studying the ways of mice and men.
But with invertebrates they're often found
Quite ignorant of how they should begin.
The object of my study is to try
To help both man and worm see eye to eye.
-- D.N. Howell (1973); published 1974, in Megadrilogica 1(10)