Oftentimes, when students are faced with the task of presenting their science fair project to judges and other spectators, they may not know how to organize their presentation. Whether its because they have never practiced or rehearsed their presentation, or just because they are nervous when it comes down to the big moment, its important that they realize how their thoughts should be collected and organized. This will allow the student to keep focused and on track, as well as smoothly transition from one topic to another. Here is a “skeleton” of how a good oral presentation should go. Any words in parentheses are actions or thoughts that should go through your mind.
What do and what to say
(Make sure you are standing just off to the side of your project so that everyone can see it when they walk up. Appearance can be important, so do hesitate to dress up. Don’t be slouched in a chair and have the judge get you ready for YOUR presentation! Shake the judge’s hand and introduce yourself. EYE CONTACT IS KEY!)
Hello, my name is (your name) and my science fair project is on (very brief description of your topic, but don’t be too vague).
The reason that I chose this particular project is because (explain why you wanted to do this project: Interesting, fun, challenging, etc.). The first part of the experiment was to develop a hypothesis on the outcome of the experiment. My hypothesis was (state your hypothesis, along with why you think that would be the outcome).
Before I began the procedure, I researched some literature on the subject. The sources that I chose to read were (list your sources and say why they are relevant). According to my research, the outcome of the experiment should be (state the theoretical or experiments conducted on the same topic. Do they agree with your hypothesis?)
The materials that I used in my experiment were (list materials and say how they were relevant to the experiment, as well as any safety precautions that you had to take with any of the materials).
This experiment followed a specific procedure as follows: (list the steps IN ORDER and thoroughly explain each step so that there is no confusion. The last thing you want is a judge not knowing what you even did!)
After following all of the steps in the procedure, the results that I found were (explain the outcome. What happened? Don’t omit any details in the results that could be useful in the conclusion!)
From the results, I came to the conclusion that (What did you learn? Were you right/wrong? It’s ok to be wrong because then you can talk about what you learned, which is the point of the whole science fair. Did you enjoy the process? Is there anything else that you can draw from these conclusions?)
Thank you for your time. Do you have any questions? (Answer any questions that judges or spectators may have about your experiment. Be thinking of questions that might be asked so you are prepared and have a confident response. At the end shake the hand of the judges one more time and thank them again.)