Academic Presentations
Learn to give effective academic presentations in English.
Presentation Structure
| Part | German | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| Introduction | Einführung | 10-15% |
| Main body | Hauptteil | 70-80% |
| Conclusion | Schluss | 10-15% |
| Q&A | Fragen | After |
Opening Phrases
| Purpose | Phrase |
|---|---|
| Greeting | Good morning/afternoon, everyone. |
| Introduction | My name is… and I’m here to talk about… |
| Topic | Today’s presentation is about… |
| Structure | I’ve divided my talk into three parts… |
| Duration | This will take approximately 15 minutes. |
Signposting Language
| Purpose | German | Phrases |
|---|---|---|
| Moving on | Überleiten | Let’s move on to… / Now I’d like to turn to… |
| Giving examples | Beispiele | For example… / To illustrate this… |
| Summarizing | Zusammenfassen | To sum up… / In summary… |
| Concluding | Abschließen | In conclusion… / To conclude… |
Handling Questions
| Situation | Response |
|---|---|
| Didn’t understand | Could you repeat that, please? |
| Need time | That’s an excellent question. Let me think… |
| Don’t know | I’m afraid I don’t have that information, but… |
| Redirect | Perhaps we can discuss that after the presentation. |
Visual Aids
- Keep slides simple (6 words per line, 6 lines max)
- Use images and graphs
- Face the audience, not the screen
- Say “As you can see…” when showing visuals
Open your presentation with a hook — a surprising statistic, a short story, or a provocative question — to engage your audience from the very first sentence.