Guide to Year 1 Presentation: Quantum Chemistry Practical

As well as carefully reading the content on this page, you should also view the Video Guide to the Year 1 Presentation - This has been recorded in the style of a Year 1 presentation in order to give you an idea of how the process works and what to expect.

Introduction

Scientists at all levels should be able to present their work across a range of media. So far you'll have done a lot of written reports and perhaps a poster but to be able to present science verbally is becoming increasingly important - not only for presenting to other scientists but also in engaging with the public. Presenting involves not only the ability to deliver the presentation; but also the skill in creating one that is relevant, informative, well structured and engaging.

This will be the first of a number of in-lab presentations that you'll encounter throughout your degree, e.g. you will give six in-lab presentations during your Year 2 Labs (to audiences of staff and PG demonstrators). This guide will assist you in what to expect as part of this initial presentation. Note: This document is specific to this Year 1 presentation; however, in large part it should also be helpful in preparing you for future presentations as well.

Format of the Presentation

• You will be presenting as a group of up to four people to an audience of two demonstrators.
• Groups assignments will be provided on the L4 Lab website along with session date and time of your presentation (which will either be at 1530 or 1555). The location of ALL presentations will be 29:4007 (i.e. the Lab Managers Office). For groups presenting at 1530 you should be outside 29:4007 no later than 1530. For groups presenting at 1555 you should wait just outside the lab area (i.e. by the lift) and you should be present there by 1550.
• You should decide, as a group, who will present each part of the work.
• Your group's presentation must last for no more than 10 minutes.
• Be prepared for a Question & Answer (Q & A) session, again up to 10 minutes, following your presentation.

Note: Watching the Video Guide to the Year 1 Presentation may give you a better idea of what the format of the presentation involves (and therefore what you can expect).

Preparing for the Presentation

It is recommended that your group arranges to meet (at the very latest) at the start of the timetabled session (i.e. 1300) on the day of your presentation, so you have time to collate your work, generate any needed additional material, organise how you will be dividing the presentation between you and practice. Note that your personal preparation for the presentation should have been well under way prior to this session, i.e. the time you would normally take to write a lab report should have been used as preparation time.

If there are late (or no) shows to arranged meetings, please inform the Lab Manager - It may be that latecomers/absentees will then presenting seperately (or, if there is not an acceptable reason for their behaviour, receiving zero for the presentation).

Make sure that as part of your preparation you have reviewed the comments on your Interim Report.

Preparing the Presentation Material

All slides for the presentation must be contained in a single PowerPoint document - feel free to prepare the sections separately but they MUST be combined into one document before the start of the presentation. This document must be brought to the presentation on a USB Memory Stick and the file must be compatible with Microsoft Office 2013.

• Use big, clear images to illustrate your points.
• Put information in bullet points or short sentences, rather than blocks of text. It is better for people to be listening to your explanation than reading everything and it is not good to have a text filled presentation (which you just read out).
• Think about the order you present your results/slides - what makes the most sense?
• Things tend to be clearer on a computer screen than when projected. Make sure that text is large, particularly axis and figure labels. The default text size for graphs in Excel is too small to be seen in a presentation. Make the labels larger than you think they need to be.
• While colours can make a presentation interesting - think about if they will show up clearly. Pale colours can be difficult to see on a projector.

The presentation should start with a title slide (giving the title of your talk and the members of your group) and end with a slide containing your literature references. The body of the presentation should include results/discussion on:

• Molecule drawing in GaussView
• Energy and gradient convergence plots
• Bond length plot (X-ray against PM6)
• Bond length accuracy discussion
• Molecular volume and density accuracy discussion

Note that there should be a maximum of two slides associated with each topic.

How to Present

• Know the subject, i.e. be sure you have adequately researched the topic before presenting.
• Be clear on which parts you are presenting and how the rest of the presentation is structured.
• Ensure the whole presentation is ordered in a logical manner.
• Practise - Ideally in front of people so that you get comfortable with talking in front of an audience and they can provide feedback.
• Practise as a group - You need to know what the other people are going to say in the talk, and be comfortable with all of the information being presented.
• If you aren't the first to talk, be ready for when you need to start.
• When presenting look about the room and/or make eye contact. Don't look/talk down to your notes or the board.
• Talk loud enough for the furthest person away from you to be able to hear you clearly.
• Try and enjoy it! If you're enthusiastic and (at least pretending to!) care about what you're presenting then your audience will be far more engaged.

Note: If there is a teacher or lecturer who you think has a good presenting style - figure out what you like about it and try to emulate it. The same goes for doing the opposite of anything you dislike.

The Q & A Session

This session will last ~10 minutes. During it each student will be asked ~3 questions (although there may be supplementary questions to the main questions).

You can expect questions regarding the practical work, underlying theory and related topics. This includes (but not exclusively) the analysis you've performed, basic chemistry of glucose including conformations of cyclohexane and crystallography. You may be asked some questions on the computational methods used, but you are NOT expected to understand how the calculations themselves work. Note that you will not necessarily be asked questions on the section that you presented, so make sure you are familiar with the whole presentation.

Pointers:

• The assessors are trying to test the extent of your understanding/knowledge, so don't expect to be able to give a perfect answer to all the questions - Just give it your best shot.
• If you don't know the answer then see if you can say something along the lines of "I'm not sure, I think that because X... possibly that might be responsible for Y". Remember that as well as marks for chemical knowledge, there are also marks for logical reasoning and style of delivery.
• If you don't understand a question, ask for it to be repeated - nobody is going to judge you for this (and it gives you extra time to think!)
• Don't jump straight in - Think about the question and how you want to answer before you start to answer.

The best way to prepare for questions (apart from doing sufficient research that you are confident about the subject area) is to practice in your group beforehand - Come up with questions to ask each other (and then decide how best to answer them) - You might actually come up with some of the questions the assessors will use!

Note: The Video Guide to the Year 1 Presentation includes an example of a Q & A session.

Some Advice from Year 1 Students (who have given the Presentation)

Comments about the experience:

• It was much more relaxed (and less formal) than I thought it would be.
• There is a laser pointer you can use.
• Relax - the assessors are nice people and have been in your position before.
• Wasn't too bad.
• Very relaxing and comforting having just PG students marking us.
• Presenting in front of just my group and to two PG's (rather than in front of other students and/or staff) made it easier.
• Before giving the presentation it is not easy to understand what it will be like. So it was better that the first in-lab presentation was now rather than in the second year (when it counts towards my degree mark).
• Some questions were nice, some weren't.
• Questions started easy to test basic understand and then progressed to test the understanding of the topic and ability to apply theory to other examples.
• I found the idea of the recording a bit nerve-racking but the feedback is going to be a lot more useful if there is a record you can refer to (and use to pick up on small mistakes).

Hints and tips for preparing for the presentation:

• It is useful to meet up with (or at the very least contact) the other people in your group before the presentation session.
• My advice is you should DEFINITELY meet up with your group beforehand (i.e. well before the presentation day) - Being clearly organised as a group is extremely useful for this presentation. What worked well for my group was to split the presentation into (in our case three) distinct topic areas. We then went home and each of us thoroughly researched one of these areas, before meeting up to share our findings and discuss the topics - This really aided our understanding.
• Make use of the references provided in the script.
• Ensure the presentation covers all the topics you are required to.
• Look into the theory in a little more depth than was needed for the practical.
• Don't worry about the detail of the quantum mechanics behind the calculations - you're not expected to know that level of detail, but try to get a rough idea of what's going on.
• Explain the theory of your section of the presentation to group members prior to the delivery - it helps understanding the material and how they link with each part, so can aid in the presentation's flow.
• Take queue cards in with you if necessary, but remember they are a prompt and not a reading script!
• You should know the whole presentation and not just your part - don't be surprised if you are asked questions about the other parts of the presentation.
• Know and be able to show the calculations.
• Make sure you have your presentation timings right.
• Practice, practice, practice - We ran through it several times, it was noticeably better each time.
• Request feedback from your group whilst practising your personal delivery - practice makes perfect!

Assessment Criteria

The presentation will be worth 35% of your practical mark. The presentation is expected to last no more than 10 minutes, with a further 10 minutes allotted for a Q & A session. In the Q & A session each student will be asked ~3 questions. Your ability and manner in which you answer these questions will be worth 35%. Note: The final 30% of your marks for this practical comes from the assessment of your Interim Report.

For the Presentation the assessors will be considering:

• ORGANISATION OF GROUP - Have you divided the presentation reasonably?
• CLEAR/LOGICAL PRESENTATION - Covering key information supported by visual aids.
• PRESENTATION FIGURES - Screenshots are good, but make sure they clearly show what you are trying to explain. The same molecule from different angles might help. Label what they are - it can be easy to forget simple things when you are talking in front of an audience.
• PRESENTATION GRAPHS - These should have captions. It's a common mistake for axis labels to be too small to be seen when projected in presentations.
• REFERENCES - Make sure you have referenced your sources correctly and with a consistent format.
• STYLE/MANNER - Talking coherently to audience rather than board, not mumbling or speaking too quickly, etc.

For the Q & A Session the assessors will be considering:

• ABILITY TO ANSWER QUESTIONS CLEARLY - To approach problems logically and build (complete) answers.
• CHEMISTRY UNDERSTANDING - Of the work undertaken in the practical as well as the underlying and associated relevant theory.

Feedback and Marks

Your Overall Presentation Mark will be available (within one week of assessment) from the Marks section of the Level 4 Lab Website.

Your presentation will be recorded and after you have finished the Q & A session and have left, it will continue to record as the assessors discuss the presentation and the individual performance of your group members. Within a few days of the presentation this video will be uploaded and a link provided to the members of your group.

It is anticipated that you will watch the video and, having heard the recorded feedback comments from the assessors, will then review your portion of the presentation so you are best able to understand/evaluate what you did well and how you could improve. This also means that, prior to your next in-lab presentation (in Year 2 Semester 1), you will be able to repeat the review process; rather than having to try to remember what you did and the presentation feedback from many months previously.
Warning: The audio level of the recording may be low so it is recommended that when watching that you either use headphones or playback the video on a device capable of having a loud sound output.

Note: The Video Guide to the Year 1 Presentation includes (at the end) an example of the recorded feedback.

A NOTE ABOUT APPEARING ON VIDEO: The recording will be made with the camera pointing towards the presentation screen, normally with the students visible on either side. This is useful since it enables you to review what the assessors are referring to if they include comments about your presentation style or manner. However, if you are really not comfortable being visible in the video, you simply need to stand a bit further off to the side during the presentation (i.e. off shot).