| Over the Chinese New Year holiday, I had the pleasure of providing a private online class to a professional family in Hsinchu, Taiwan: mom, dad, and son. Our goal was to help them improve their spoken and presentation skills, and as a part of that, the father made a PowerPoint (PPT) about a trip with his wife to Europe. We discussed some ways to create PPT slides. One key point is, in general, avoid long text. It can be dull, unclear, and hard to read (or even see). Instead, many people suggest bullet points to communicate main ideas.
Q: How do you word bullet points? Do I start them all with “To”? A. Actually, the best answer is: “It depends.” You may want to start with “To,” but the main idea is, be parallel. That is, however, you start each bullet point, be as consistent as you can. Here are some examples.
Beautiful Prague, Czech Republic Maybe you want a PPT slide that explains “Why is Prague a popular place to visit? You may want to use the ADJ. + NOUN format. – preserved artifacts Or maybe you want a slide to explain, “Why I went to Prague?” Here the “to” construction work best. – To support my wife, who won an award from her employer How about a slide to describe “Taiwan.” You might want to use straight adjectives. – small How about a slide giving instructions or commands? Straight verbs is probably best. On the topic, “How to do well in school?” – Sit near the front Perhaps you want a PPT slide about “Some of my favorite hobbies.” Here the gerund may be the best option. – biking Note: sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you cannot be perfectly parallel. In those cases, put the “oddball” at the end of the list. For example, the last item above–“spending time with my family”– starts with a gerund like all the others, but it is longer than just one word. So, it goes at the end. That’s how you handle items that you cannot get to fit the pattern. Whatever you do, do NOT mix the formats in the bullet points, such as with “My hobbies.” below: – To swim Do YOU need help with your English presentations or skills? Let us help you today at DreyerCoaching.com! In fact, “Practice Parallelism” is one of the “12 Steps to Clearer Writing” in my award-winning book, Write Like A Champion (美國老師教你寫出好英文). Learn more and order your own copy by clicking here. Since 2010, based in the friendly USA State of Virginia, DreyerCoaching.com has been providing customized, high-quality, real-time language instruction via the internet to a global audience in their home, school, or office. Think how comfortable, confident and successful you or your child will feel, receiving personalized guidance from college-educated teachers who are native speakers and have bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees plus decades of teaching experience. Whether you are looking for help with the ABCs or the SATs, or college admissions to conversational English to business writing, we serve all ages and levels to help our students make dreams come true. Discover the Dreyer Difference. Take the first step and visit DreyerCoaching.com, send Scott an email, or schedule a free consultation to get started. 自 2010 年以来，DreyerCoaching.com 总部位于友好的美国弗吉尼亚州，一直通过互联网向全球观众在家中、学校或办公室提供有制度的、高质量的实时语言教学。 想想您或您的孩子会感到多么自在、自信和成功，从受过大学教育的教师那里获得个别的指导，这些教师都是以英语为母语，拥有学士、硕士和博士学位，以及数十年的教学经验的教师。 无论是从 英语ABC的基础课程 或 SAT 的帮助，就读美国高中，大学入学申请，还是从会话英语到商务写作，我们都为所有年龄和水平的学生提供服务，帮助我们的学生实现梦想。 发觉 Dreyer 的不同之处。 迈出第一步，游览 DreyerCoaching.com网站，向 Scott 发送电子邮件，可开始安排一个免费咨询。 |
Ask Scott Dreyer: What do you write in PowerPoints (PPTs)?
