About This Course

Giving a research talk (say, at a conference, to your department or in your research group meeting) is a really important part of a scientist’s career. But, putting together and delivering a talk can be a nerve-wracking struggle. Maybe you have little to no experience giving research talks. Or maybe you’ve been doing it for a while, but feel like there is room for improvement. Either way, this course is for you!

Share Your Research is a FREE 5-week course that will guide you through the steps of creating and delivering a good research talk.

By the end of this course, you will have:

• A detailed outline plan for your research talk.
• Techniques and strategies for delivering an engaging and effective talk.
• Approaches for finding and refining your preferred speaking style.
• Strategies for practicing and receiving feedback on your talk.

A course for anyone who needs to give research talks

We designed this course for anyone who will be giving research-based scientific talks in the future. This list includes (but is not limited) to advanced undergraduate and graduate students, postdocs, as well as early-career or well-established researchers who are interested in learning more about giving a good scientific talk. While most of our instructors have a background in the life sciences, the lessons included in the course are broadly applicable to other disciplines.

Includes 4 modules and a plan for your research talk

• Module 1, FRAMING YOUR TALK: This module introduces you to a framework to help you define the foundations of an effective talk: who is the audience, what are your goals and what is your core message. This module will also offer advice to help you discover your speaking style.
• Module 2, START BUILDING YOUR TALK: This module presents strategies to help you outline and structure your talk and engage your audience. This module will also get you started with defining the content of the body of your talk.
• Module 3, ROUNDING OUT YOUR TALK: In this module, you will continue working on the structure and content of your talk, focusing on the introduction and ending. The module also discusses more strategies for audience engagement and talk titles.
• Module 4, GIVING YOUR TALK: This module provides tips and best practices to deliver an effective talk: from strategies for practicing and receiving feedback, to lessening the nerves and dealing with the Q&A.
• MY RESEARCH TALK PLAN: As you work through the course, you will be prompted to apply what you’re learning to your own presentation by completing a series of assessments. The responses to these exercises will be captured in a downloadable document called “My Talk Plan”, which is essentially an outline for your research talk. It is organized in a way so that relevant sections may be easily applied to the creation and delivery of future talks.

Built with your schedule in mind

We know you have lots of things to do, so we designed this 5-week course to take 1.5 to 3 hours per week. There are an average of 7 videos per module; each video is 2 to 6 minutes in length.