Lorely Orbe - Blog 2

Class presentations were about Happiness and Well-being, eating and health habits, several forms of self-care and how to pay it forward, and their impact on people and society. Giving presentations in front of a class gives us the skills to keep improving our performance in speech and communication, which was present within our group when we had to prepare the presentation, with external people to get the interviews about the topic, and at the time of reaching out to college resources to conclude our presentation and get the information we needed.

Being informed could change our perspective of how to live in a significant manner; that’s the reason the group presentations were an excellent chance to get to know others’ thoughts about small daily things that could improve our lives and physical and mental health significantly.

As we all know, there is a lot of information on the web, and we have to learn how to search for reliable sources since the web is a place where misinformation occurs often. The habit of searching for the truth should be applied in any field of our lives, like searching on the web or listening to what others believe is correct.

Learning to listen would help us to understand different topics with different opinions, but a good habit is to question all we hear, too. In a lot of cases, no one is right or wrong; everything lies in our own values and beliefs, but keeping calm helps us to maintain an open mind to find solutions or better alternatives in many cases. For example, no one can tell us how to eat correctly or how many hours we should sleep, but we can conclude on the best way to do it to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Sharing our thoughts also helps us realize who we are because there are a lot of things that we don’t speak up about because there wasn’t a chance before, but when it is, we can see that all of us have a vision of the things inside us, sometimes we can feel alone, and we believe that no one is there to help us, but there is always more people that relate to us and are struggling with their well-being too.

My experience with the preparation of this presentation was different from the previous one. This time, I went to the ICED department to look for a list of agencies to provide to my classmates; I also did research on their website and got so much information about their services, agencies, organizations, and undertakings they provide. Doing research on this topic was also a very interesting and informative experience that led me to reflect on my habits and choices.

The information given in the presentations was excellent and educational, and unlike the first presentations, where we already had the information and only had to summarize and explain it, this time, the presenters had to research and prepare their parts, find reliable and updated sources, and prepare an explanation of it.

The topics presented significantly impacted the audience because they are relevant to young people; for instance, many people agreed with what was said by nodding their heads, reacting to shocking information, or laughing at funny comments from the presenters.

One of the things I noticed and enjoyed the most was that some presenters gave real-life examples, explaining how their life relates to the topic they were talking about, for instance, the way they changed their eating habits, how life is different for a pregnant woman, and how they’ve noticed differences between their life and what they researched about the topic. These examples are most likely to connect with the audience because they are usual and happen on a regular basis.

The last presentation talked about a movie, “Pay It Forward.” They told their experience with the movie, and that motivated the audience to watch it; they also showed clips of the movie, which was an introduction for the audience to watch it.

One of the things that I noticed was repetitive, and in my opinion, tiresome about the presentation was that most of the presenters read their part of the presentation, showing little to no preparation.

I am especially interested in the overall topic of the presentations; therefore, I was excited to witness my classmates’ presentations and to do my own research; in my opinion, some presenters should have gone more in-depth on the topic and not just given an overview, some others should have summarized their part so it doesn’t feel repetitive and prolonged, and they should have talked louder or used the microphone provided in the class, even though the majority of them did, which was a great use of the tool.

Some aspects that were not appealing to the audience were that people in the group did not know the order of the presentation, and members of the group were coming and going from the front. All the groups should have had better communication and organization. The groups also should have divided the presentation in a better way so the people in the front are not mixed and in the way of another member.

The presenters’ clothing choices were mostly unprofessional and distracting from the topic they were presenting; personally, I got distracted by a presenter who was wearing themed footwear. I also noticed graphic shirts, colored clothes, and shorts, and I’m sure that more than one member of the audience was distracted by this aspect.

The presenters’ stance on the front could have been better; we all need to improve our way of standing in front of the class and build more confidence. It is okay to be nervous about talking in public, but we should learn ways to appear confident to not distract the audience and keep the focus on the presentation.

Despite the things that can be improved, some presenters gave an excellent performance, and they made the topic fun and relatable. They did more research and were more informed about their presentation, which shows great determination and focus.