Welcome to the class webpage for English 3B, the purpose of which is to further enhance your presentation skills. Students should expect to complete this course with a firm grasp of skills to make presentations in English.

As you will readily understand, we have an ambitious syllabus for you to enjoy. While you will certainly be busy with all your other exciting classes, it is of utmost importance for you to devote sufficient time and effort to this course. Homework, for example, should be finished on time. Presentations should be rehearsed until you are fully confident in your masterpiece.

 Course Objectives 

The purpose of this course is, of course, to equip you fine students with the skills to go out into the wide, wide world and use English.

 Weekly Classes 

Welcome back, Gentle Students, and I certainly hope you enjoyed your summer vacation. From here through the dash that we call "Autumn Term", I ask you to devote yourselves wholeheartedly to the various tasks you will encounter in our class.

In the midst of several goals, our primary two this fall will be to (a) conduct poster sessions, and (b) become proficient in multiple-speaker presentations. Thus, with no further ado, let us embark on the former goal, which begins with an idea and the ensuing abstract.

 Week 1 (September 20, 2023) — Term Introduction 

This fall we will we will talk some about the oral components of public speaking and making presentation. First, let's walk through our plan for this fall semester.

An important part of our class this term will be abstracts and proposals. These are, of course, short written statements of a published paper or a presentation, and as such they both need to be informative yet concise.

Thus, today I would like to take you all to the IEEE Xplore Digital Library, which contains a huge number of abstracts and published articles. Let's walk through it briefly.

We will also devote some time to improving fluency, Gentle Students. Today that means working with a topic very germane to your lifestyle and your academic major. Specifically, this means how to avoid surveillance on that phone in your pocket or backpack. This comes to you courtesy of TED Talks and Christopher Soghoian.

 Homework: 

 Week 2 (September 27) — Writing Proposals & Abstracts (2)  

Our second class will be devoted to two primary tasks. First, we will be considering your topic ideas for the poster session in December. To inspire and impress you, we will be looking at posters from years past; some of these are actual posters, and some will be digital posters.

As you remember, your homework last week was to collect abstracts from the IEEE Xplore Digital Library. Today I would like you to look at those 10 in detail and mark the various parts in color as shown here. Note that not every abstract will have all five parts.

Our second class will be devoted to some basics of writing abstracts.

 Class Material & Homework: 

 Week 3 (October 4) — More Planning and Abstracts  

Our first task today is to further examine abstracts and, more germaine to this class, conference proposal abstracts. Here again is the handout about genre analysis using colors

Here we have some abstract examples from one language teaching journal. Not to be outdone, here are a handful of examples from math and computer science journals.

Next, please open your Poster Session Student Guidebook to page 9.

 Class material: 

 Week 4 (October 11) — Presentations  

Today you will be making a presentation in front of a small group (out of the three groups in our class). One facet that you will include is a Q&A time, for which you should be prepared.

As was required in the first term, you are required to complete a critique for each of your presentations this term. Lest you need some refreshing, here are the various critique files from last term.

File Request (Presentation #1 material)

 Class files: 

 Week 5 (October 18) — Writing Proposals & Abstracts (2)  

Our fifth class will be devoted to becoming more familiar with the details of poster sessions. Second, we will also further examine abstracts and—more germaine to this class—conference proposal abstracts.

Courtesy of George Hess, here is a very useful video on giving an effective poster presentation.

 More Poster Session Links 

 Homework, my good people: 

 Week 6 (October 25) — Posters, Posters, and Posters  

On this day, my minions, we will be examining the configuration(s) of posters.

We will devote the latter half of our class to your upcoming poster presentations. How you use your time is, of course, up to you, but please use your time well. I will be dropping by to check on each group and answer any questions you have.

 Homework: 

Remember that we will have no class on November 1 because of the university festival.

 Week 7 (November 8) — Multiple-Speaker Formats  

In this class we will examine aspects of presenting in a group. As you may well already be aware, this is a very common situation and one that you will certainly be involved with as you collaborate on research in the future.

Let's spend a bit of time on some fluency work today. Here we have an interesting talk by Janet Iwasa on using animation to test hypotheses, which is very similar to some work that we do right here at Meiji.

A second area that we will address today is critical analysis, by which I mean actively evaluating presentations or speeches. The purpose, of course, is for you to practice being an articulate, thoughtful consumer of presented material. Let's again look at Dr. Iwasa's talk ...

In today's class we will be again be working some with abstracts.

 Homework: 

 Week 8 (November 15) — Poster Presentation Basics, Part 1  

As necessary, we will complete the mid-term presentations from last week.

Our second task today is to examine details about the poster presentation. I'd like to begin with a quick look at the actual boards on which you'll display your posters. Second, let's have a glance at some posters I've seen over the last year or so.

 Class Material: 

Next, my Good People, let's talk some about the actual communication in a poster session. First, remember that in your poster presentation YOU are the leader. Thus, you should begin speaking! Don't wait for someone (e.g., a teacher) to begin ... YOU are the leader. When you finish speaking, YOU ask for questions.

To begin, you can expect a couple patterns. The first is someone coming up to you and basically asking about your poster and your research. Expect this! Even if you don't understand someone's first question, assume that person is asking your poster and your research and then answer accordingly. The second pattern is for you to begin the conversation and ask if the person would like to know more: "May I tell you about our research?"

Thereafter is another crucial time: the Q&A part. Recall that the speaker makes a shorter speech—say, 3-5 minutes. The listener often then poses questions, which you, Gentle Student, should be prepared for! Thus, consider what questions might be asked. Of course, also think about how you can answer those questions.

Recall that I like to hear two things when someone asks a question. The first, of course, is to thank that person for his/her question. The second one is to repeat the question. Again, please repeat the question. This allows you to (a) check that your understanding of the question is correct, (b) make sure that everyone heard the question, and (c) give yourself a moment to think about your answer. Here are my Q&A guidelines.

 Week 9 (November 22) — Poster Presentation Basics, Part 2  

At this point we will devote our time to learning the basics of poster sessions. In essence, this is simple a less formal presentation in which the speaker(s) present their research in a more casual format before a small number of people; of course, interaction between the speaker and his/her audience is very easy in such cases.

Courtesy of George Hess, here is a very useful video on giving an effective poster presentation.

 More Poster Session Links 

Oh, go on, we can't stop there, can we? Here we have more poster session links:

 Even More Poster Session Links 

 Week 10 (November 29) — Poster Data Submission  

We are getting close, my good people. By today you will submit your poster data, which I would like as a PDF.

 Homework: 

 Week 11 (December 6) — Poster Session Rehearsal  

We are getting close, my good people. Today we will have a 'dress rehearsal', which means you will be presenting your posters here in class.

Here is the 2021 online poster session program.

 Week 12 (December 13) — Poster Session  

See you at our poster session, everyone! Remember that we will be meeting on the 6th floor, not in our regular classroom.

The poster session link is here.

 Week 13 (December 20, 2023) — Poster Extensions  

Welcome back, and a belated Happy New Year to you all! I hope your winter holidays were relaxing and enjoyable.

First, thank you all for your hard work making and presenting your posters. Your next tasks are the following: prepare one written report about your poster (i.e., the same content) that should be perhaps 4-5 pages. Note that this report is not your presentation notes. Your second written report will be about several conferences where you might present your poster. For both papers please watch and refer to the video below on "Formatting Academic Papers".

 Class Material & Homework: 

 Week 14 (January 10, 2024) — Course Finale  

 Homework: