Some tips and suggestions on creating a good talk for CS 8751:

• Check out Mark Hill's Oral Presentation Advice for tips on giving talks and especially pay attention to things to avoid from "How to Give a Bad Talk."
• Look over the feedback form that I and your fellow students will be filling out to see what you will be graded on.
• Do NOT simply structure your talk in the order of the paper. A talk is often much different from a paper. Your talk should have the following approximate format:
  • Quick intro - title slide, 1-2 overhead description of the overall idea, plus perhaps a slide showing an outline of the talk.
  • Background - present any background material needed to understand the talk.
  • Major ideas - break the talk into sections, each covering a major idea/contribution of the work. Try to make each idea self contained, but also make the ideas proceed on a logical progression (simple to complex).
  • Results - Cover any experimental or theorem results proving the claims of the paper.
  • Related work - discuss (briefly, 1-2 overheads) other related algorithms and how the work being discussed differs.
  • Future work - discuss what the author(s) mention as future new directions to pursue.
  • Wrap-up - try to summarize the talk on 1-2 overheads.
• If you are using an outline slide with bullets you may want to have the slide reappear just before you proceed on to the next bulleted idea (you can highlight the thing coming next in a different color).
• Pictures and graphs make a talk much easier to understand in almost all cases. Start out preparing your talk by assembling your pictures.
• Make each overhead about one idea or concept. Pick a meaningful title.
• Avoid being wordy - keep the number of words down as much as possible, you want the audience listening to you, not reading.
• Don't be afraid to draw on the board to illustrate something that someone has a question about or doesn't seem clear.
• The talk is 35 minutes long, you should have plenty of time to cover a reasonable amount of material.
• Above all, do some significant preparation.

For those commenting on a talk, (the +6 and +8 people), you should prepare a 2-4 overhead commentary on a critical idea you think should be covered in more depth. You should plan on meeting with the speaker and finding out what they plan to cover.

Audience members should remember to read the paper before attending the talk and try to ask helpful questions.