Speaking in academic contexts means being able to give effective presentations and taking an active role in seminar discussions.

  • to help you understand a subject more deeply
  • to enable you to share ideas and insights with other students
  • to hear the thoughts and ideas of other students
  • to challenge and perhaps change your ideas
  • to increase and clarify your knowledge
  • to improve your ability to think critically
  • to increase your confidence in speaking
  • to improve your English speaking skills

Checklist

 Greeting the audience

  • Good morning/afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
  • Good morning/afternoon, everyone.

 Expressing the purpose

  • My purpose/objective/aim today is…
  • What I want to do this morning/afternoon/today is…
  • I’m here today to…

 Giving the structure

  • This talk is divided into four main parts.
  • To start with/Firstly, I’d like to look at…
  • Then/Secondly, I’ll be talking about…
  • Thirdly…
  • My fourth point will be about…
  • Finally, I’ll be looking at…

 Giving the timing

  • My presentation/talk/lecture will take/last about 20 minutes.

 Handling questions

  • At the end of my talk, there will be a chance to ask questions.
  • I’ll be happy to answer any questions you have at the end of my presentation.

 Visual aids

  • As you can see here…
  • Here we can see…
  • If we look at this slide…
  • This slide shows…
  • If you look at the screen, you’ll see…
  • This table/diagram/chart/slide shows…
  • I’d like you to look at this…
  • Let me show you…
  • Let’s (have a) look at…
  • On the right/left you can see…

Transitions

  • Let’s now move on to/turn to…
  • I now want to go on to…
  • This leads/brings me to my next point, which is…
  • I’d now like to move on to/turn to…
  • So far we have looked at… Now I’d like to…

Giving examples

  • Let me give you an example…
  • such as…
  • for instance…
  • A good example of this is…

 Summarising

  • What I’m trying to say is…
  • Let me just try and sum that up before we move on to…
  • So far, I’ve presented…

 Digressing

  • I might just mention…
  • Incidentally…

Summing up

  • Summing up…
  • To summarise…
  • So, to sum up…
  • To recap…
  • Let me now sum up.

 Concluding

  • Let me end by saying…
  • I’d like to finish by emphasising…
  • In conclusion I’d like to say…
  • Finally, may I say…

 Closing

  • Thank you for your attention/time.
  • Thank you (for listening/very much).

 Questions

  • If you have any questions or comments, I’ll be happy to answer them now.
  • If there are any questions, I’ll do my best to answer them.
  • Are there any more questions?

What makes an effective discussion?

Individual actions
  • prepare for the topic
  • be willing to listen to others
  • build on what other people have said
  • be willing to change your opinions
  • not be afraid to give your honest opinions
  • support your opinions with evidence
  • give others a chance to speak (i.e. do not dominate the discussion)
  • encourage others to speak by inviting them to give their opinions
  • show your agreement or disagree politely
  • make your points clearly but briefly
  • allow others to finish, without interrupting
Group actions
  • there are clear aims, so that everyone knows what the outcome of the discussion should be
  • there is a timetable for different stages of the discussion, and a time limit for the discussion itself
  • there is time at the end for summing up what has been agreed or decided
  • only one person speaks at any one time
  • everyone contributes by saying something

Discussion skills: how to take part effectively, giving opinions, state your opinion and ask for others’ opinions, agree and disagree (politely) in an academic context, ask for clarification, giving suggestions and expressing uncertainty.

Useful phrases

Giving opinions

  • I think that…
  • It seems to me that…
  • As far as I’m concerned…

Giving others the chance to speak

  • Thanks, Alice, for your contribution, but we need to hear from other people as well.

Inviting others to contribute

  • What do you think about what I’ve just said George?

Agreeing

  • Yes, I agree with you.
  • That’s a good point.

Disagreeing

  • I see what you mean, but…
  • I take your point, but…

Setting aims

  • Our goal for this conversation is…
  • Our aim today is to…

Setting the timetable

  • We’ll spend the first fifteen minutes discussing, and the last five coming to a decision.

Summing up

  • So, to sum up…
  • We’re running out of time, so…
  • So, it seems that, as a group, we’ve decided…
  • All things considered, we feel that…
  • We couldn’t reach an agreement on this issue…
  • Although we agree that…, we still stress that…

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