Department of Chemistry
Department of Chemistry
ORAL PRESENTATIONS FOR SPECIAL PROJECT
We will meet in the Chemistry seminar room, Gilbert 324, and a data projector and laptop will be available (the laptop is running Windows 7). We now have a Mac to VGA connector for the projector so you can bring your Mac if you like. Please plan to be there at 1 pm so that we can get all the PP files loaded before we start the presentations. Unless you are a great speaker, a talk can be very boring without some other focus than only the speaker! Also, keep in mind that it is very difficult for the audience to relate to numerical values that are not written down in some organized format and presented in tables. You may not have the complete analysis done yet, but you should have enough information ready to tell a good story. One purpose of giving a presentation to one's peers, is to see another's perspective, and learn what points might be missing or need more work. You have the opportunity to finalize your results and analysis after the presentation in the written report due final's week.
1. Start off with an overview and the motivation for the project. Give your hypothesis. Look at the suggested outline in the Exp 6 handout on pages 5-7.
2. Briefly describe the instrumentation and sampling methods that you used but don't be too detailed in your presentation about the experimental procedure. Give enough detail that an informed chemist can figure out what you did. The more in-depth details should be in your written report. For example, you should indicate that you prepared your standards over a certain concentration range from a given chemical, however, do not indicate the masses weighed, the volumetric flasks or pipettes used, or the dilutions performed. Likewise, for a sample preparation step such as digestion, present the general scheme but not every detail. If you use a more complex sample preparation, separation, and/or pre-concentration scheme that has several steps, such as ion exchange pre-concentration, solvent extraction, or solid phase extraction (SPE), outline the steps you used (e.g., solvents, mixing, buffers, etc). Often a slide with a list of the steps is helpful for the audience to be able to figure out what you did.
3. Do not assume your audience knows the structure of all compounds. Prepare a slide showing the structures of organic analytes or reagents, for example, and of chemical reactions that are critical to the procedure you used.
4. Give at least one calibration curve with the calibration equation, and SE's for slope and intercept. Summarize your results in a clearly labeled table so that comparisons can be easily made by your audience.
5. Complete the circle - did you answer prove or disprove your hypothesis? When discussing possible improvements or future work, be succinct. Focus on two or three points. You can make additional suggestions in your written report due next week.
6. Practice your talk (as a group if possible) using your slides and make sure it is less than 15 minutes but more than 10 minutes. We will have a brief opportunity for audience questions at the end of each talk.
7. For a talk of 10 to 15 minutes, you need roughly 6-12 slides.
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last updated: 11/05/2012 cp