Use Of Visual Aids

Visuals are important in any professional presentation. But when you give a presentation in a foreign language, they are more than important. Visual information is highly memorable and reduces the amount of talking you have to do. So, a good presentation, which includes visuals, will be much more effective than one without.

Visuals help to:

• Focus the attention of your audience

• Illustrate points which are hard to visualise

• Reinforce your main ideas

• Involve and motivate the audience

A good picture to be used in an oral presentation

• is easy to read (large lettering, good contrast),

• explains itself (clear title, preferably a conclusion too)

• contains only relevant information,

• does not contain jargon or difficult codes that the audience needs to translate.

Ex. 24. In the following text, fill in the gaps with words or phrases from the box. Also, note the most useful recommendations.

a) categorization	d) digits	g) transparency	j) trends
b) text	e) axes	h) appendix	k) relationship
c) circles	f) results	i) columns	l) height

Key Points for Successful Presentation of Statistical Information

1. Data can be presented in the text, in a table, or pictorially as a chart, diagram or graph. For reference purposes, tables are usually the only sensible option. These are usually put in an (1) _____, with a summary in the text for demonstration purposes.

2. Sets of numerical results should usually be presented as tables or pictures rather than included in the (2) _____.

3. When whole numbers (integers) are given in text, numbers less than or equal to nine should be written as words, numbers from 10 upwards should be written in (3) _____.

4. In general, tables are better than graphs for giving structured numeric information, whereas graphs are better for indicating (4) _____ and making broad comparisons or showing relationships.

5. Tables and graphs should, ideally, be self-explanatory. The title should be informative, and rows and (5) _____ of tables or (6) _____ of graphs should be clearly labeled.

1. Graphs and Charts

The two main types of graphical presentation of research results are line graphs and bar charts.

Line Graphs

Line graphs are useful to display more than one (7) _____ in the same picture. While there is no general rule, graphs with more than four or five lines tend to become confusing unless the lines are well separated. In a graph with more than one line, different line styles (e.g. solid line, dashed line etc.), colours and/or plotting symbols (e.g. asterisks, (8) _____ etc.) should be used to distinguish the lines.

Using tables with numbers is in most cases not recommended. Remember that an audience reads everything you show on a (9) _____, and while they read they pay less attention to what you say.

Bar Charts

B ar charts display simple (10) _____ clearly. They are not generally useful for large amounts of structured information. Since the horizontal axis represents a discrete (11) _____, there is often no inherent order to the bars. In this case, the chart is clearer to read if the bars are sorted in order of (12) _____, e.g. the first bar represents the variety with the highest yield, the next bar displays the second highest yield and so on.

Figure 1 gives examples of two bar charts displaying the same data. These show grain yields for six groups formed by combination of three wheat varieties and two cultivation methods.

Fig. 1a is the better layout for demonstrating differences between cultivation methods, whereas Fig. 1b is better for showing change.