B) Learn to STRUCTURE your TALK. Use the following phrases while giving a talk at a scientific gathering.

1. Outlining the topic: What I’m going to talk about is (the following)…; My topic is …; The topic of my presentation is …;

2. Giving a pre-view of the structure: I’m going to divide the topic under 3 main headings: First…, Second…, Third…; I’ll take questions at the end of the talk; You can ask me questions as we go along.

3. Beginning: To begin with,…; First of all,…; To start with,…; First I’ll give you some background information.

4. Introducing a summary of a point: So,…; So, what we’ve got now is that…; So, what that means is that…; In short,…; In other words,….

5. Indicating that you’ve have finished with one sub-topic: OK, now…; Enough on that; So much for that;

6. Indicating that you’re going to start a new sub-topic: Now let’s move on to …; Now on to …;

7. Indicating that you’re going to give an example: For example,…; For instance, …; To give you an example,…; One way to do this is …; One way this can happen is …; If we look at …, we see that /why /how /where…;

8. Indicating that you’re going to digress: By the way, …; Incidentally, …; To digress a bit, …;

9. Indicating that the digression is over: Anyway,…; As I was saying before, …; To get back to;

10. Indicating that you’re going to talk about the problem: The thing is that …; The problem is that …; But there is a problem /a catch.

11. Finishing: To sum up the main points, …; To sum up my main conclusions, …; To recap;

12. Taking questions: Are there any questions?; If there are no more questions, I’ll hand over to (the next speaker). Thank you very much.

Here is a sample of a conference meeting. Pick the most useful phrases of the chairman and the participants and add them to your vocabulary. SIMULATE a mini-seminar session in class.

C h a i r m a n: Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention, please? The program for this morning’s session will be concerned with the broad heading of “Technology, Environment and Man”. To start with, we’ll be discussing the present state of things, and then we are going to consider the suggestions to improve the situation.

Well, now, in the first session we’re going to begin by considering the relationship between air pollution and premature mortality, and this theme will be introduced by our first speaker.

Ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to give the floor now to Professor Lindberg, who is well known for his numerous publications in the area, as well as for his proactive support of the International Clean Air Society. Professor Lindberg!

P r o f. L.: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Rather than repeating parts of my background paper, in which I outlined the main issues of the subject in question, I thought I would like to present three hypotheses which could be taken up in group discussions after this talk …

Well, these, then, I would like to be discussed.

C h a i r m a n: Thank you Professor Lindberg. I’m sure my colleagues join me in thanking you for an extremely lucid presentation of the main problems confronting us, and for the persuasive way in which you put your case.

Now, as we have a few moments to spare, may I ask if there are any questions to the speaker? Yes? The gentleman at the far end of the hall, please. Would you please identify yourself?

V o i c e: My name is Jean Lebeuf, Professor of Physics at the University of Nancy, France. I have a question, or rather a request. Would it be possible for this paper to be made available in French, too?

C h a i r m a n: Professor Lindberg, would you like to answer on this point?

P r o f. L.: Certainly, Mr. Chairman. I can assure Professor Lebeuf that translators will also be taking part in out discussion, and that all the conference languages will be used in the summaries.

C h a i r m a n: Thank you, Professor Lindberg. I now declare the meeting closed. We’ll meet again in the plenary session at 4.15 to hear the summaries.

Date: 2015-12-18; view: 760