Posters
GEOGRAPHICAL POSTER PRESENTATION
At iGeo this segment has two elements:
The production of a poster to display for participants to look at during the week
The presentation of this poster to some of the other teams
Teams should choose a specific geographical topic that relates to their country, e.g. Migration issues in Mexico, Conservation of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, Water resources in Singapore.
Teams are not to give a geographical overview of their country, and they are not to use a poster or presentation developed by someone else.
Note, the geographical poster presentation is not part of the scoring for the Olympiad medals, but we’ll be talking a popular vote and giving a prize for the best.
The Poster
The poster is not an advertising-type poster, but is similar to the type of posters that geographers would produce for a poster presentation session at a conference. Theirs are on their research, but yours will be on your chosen geographical issue. The elements of an effective poster are:
Focused, limited topic
Clear title and authors
Self-explanatory graphics. These should dominate the poster. Types of graphics that could be used include maps, photos, graphs, flowcharts, diagrams, tables. Include sources for graphics.
A minimal amount of text to describe and analyse the issue and draw some conclusions. Use short sentences and bullets point. The text should be large enough to read from 1.5 to 2 m away.
Some poster 'experts' suggest that the right proportion is about 20-25% text, 40-45% graphics and 30-40% empty space.
Poster presentation
At conferences authors present their posters by standing beside them and talking to only a couple of people at a time. At iGeo the presentations take a different form. Teams will present their posters in parallel sessions to groups of other teams. Because this will be to a large number of people (about 60), the audience will not be able to see the detail in your poster. Your team can either just talk about the issue, or if you want to, you can prepare a PowerPoint presentation. This would have the different parts of the poster, e.g. one graph or one photo, on individual slides so that the audience can see them.
Team presentations should last for a maximum of 8 minutes (it is OK to be shorter). This will allow time for some discussion after each presentation.