How to Prepare a Lecture

A lecture should be a learning experience for the teacher and the audience. Great lectures can be informative, educational and enjoyable. Or it can be the most boring experience imaginable, for the speaker and his audience.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Flow sheet and index cards
• Source material relating to the topic
• Overhead projector or screen, large sheets or chalkboard
• Markers for screen, sheets of chalkboard.
• CD player

How to Prepare a Lecture

1. Decide what you want to relate to your audience. Remember that lecturing is telling the people what they are going to see, showing it to them and explaining what they just saw, along with allowing discoveries to made along the way.

2. Prepare your opening point form or overheads. Concisely state the topic, issue or problem that forms the subject of your talk. Then prepare an outline with the information you will discuss and include supporting data for all your subpoints. Prepare your final overhead statement list, which should contain no more than four points that you want the audience to remember. If you are doing your job right, the middle sections should relate to your opening segment and support your final conclusions.

3. Practice the lecture for timing. If your rehearsal takes 45 minutes, and you have that amount of time to talk, condense the presentation to 30 or 35 minutes. Prepare some emotionally-driven material relevant to the lecture material and insert it. Move the audience emotionally with humor or pathos, and you they will open up their ears to what you have to say.

4. If possible, start your program with music that relates somehow to the subject of your lecture. Then turn off the music, give the audience a moment of silence, and start talking. Lead with your most powerful, emotional statement. As you lecture, don't merely read from your overheads or point form. Expand on the prepared material, and relate it to the audience. Rethink the material as you speak. Allow yourself to see the information in new ways and relate the discoveries you make with your audience. Share the joy of discovery.

Tips & Warnings

• The audience wants and deserves your wisdom, wit, humor, humanity and energy. They can read the material you are presenting in a book.
• If you're nervous, don't deny the feeling. Make it an ally. Open up to the nervousnous by giving yourself permission to feel it. You'll find energy there.
• Do not be afraid to go off topic. You will find your way home to the material if you keep the point form bullet points or other visuals in front of the audience's eyes.
• If you feel the audience drifting away or talking amongst themselves, take this as a cue that you are not reaching them. Don't ask them to be quiet. Instead. stop talking. Pause for a moment until they notice you and resume.
• Inject humor and humanity when you can. Be accurate about what you talk about but do not keep the language technical. Relate information wherever possible within the context of the culture and language of your audience.
• Think about how and when the audience will be using the information you are relating.
• If you think you know everything and behave as if the audience is ignorant, you will wind up being the fool.
• Audio visual aids break down, so be prepared to talk from the top of your head if a slide projector or a flow chart board malfunctions.

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