Reflection on Oral Presentation

 

This is my last presentation here in NUS and of course I took it very seriously because I hope my study here could have a nice ending pose. Thanks to the help from all of my teammates, I didn’t make my presentation as unprofessional and dragging as what I did in my home university. So in this blog, I am going to reflect on my work during this group project in terms of preparation, delivery and use of slideware.

I was responsible for the survey design, distribution, results collection and data analysis before our oral presentation, so that I am the most suitable person to address this survey report and make it a plus to our big picture. My intention was to make this part concise and to the point and at the same time not frigid and dull. So when I wrote my handscript, I tried to add my own experience and some humour to the result analysis in order to resonate with all the audience. Thus I think I was well-prepared and fully aware of what I was going to talk about. Alex, Jay and Shi Chie kept reminding me to “have the highlights in mind” before the preparation, which was directive and helpful. The PowerPoint slides were also improved by these three science guys. The data was added into corresponding pie charts and the bar graphs were complied to a single format so that the slides looked more professional. I did learn a lot from them about how to prepare for this oral presentation.

I was undoubtedly a little bit nervous when it was my turn to stand in front of the audience. My biggest weakness was that I could not get rid of my handscript, and my utterances were not fluent enough. That reduced my use of eye contact with the audience and necessary gestures to enhance my convincing image. As Madam Fazilah said, I looked less natural, relaxing and confident because I had to refer to my notes from time to time. However, this handscript was necessary for me because I did not want my speech to be dry and ungrammatical. I have to admit that public speaking skills are the biggest stumbling block for me in terms of my English proficiency. I will sharpen my spoken English further in the future.

After all, this experience is really fulfilling and rewarding, and the process of working with my teammates were very delightful, especially when we decided to shoot some funny pictures to create humour sense in our performance. Anyway, the work is done now and I am quite relieved!