[meteorite-list] Meteorite presentations (sorry if it's long!)

From: Bob King <lakewind_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:06:59 2004
Message-ID: <3DA6145D.23842.B32030_at_localhost>

Hi Ed,
Very nice of you to share how hard it went. All of us on the list
appreciate your honesty and no doubt many of us have been there. It's
natural when you're so enthusiastic and knowledgeable to go on about
a topic. I can relate. I teach community education astronomy and over
the years have learned that the fewer concepts introduced, the better. I
usually give my presentation with slides and keep it to about 25 slides
maximum (1 hour class time). I also try to invite the audience to
participate like asking them easy questions that help lead them into the
subject. Humor is the best thing. A few jokes here and there keep
everyone awake and alert. Still I've gone on too long or gotten into
obscure areas and regretted it. It's something I wrestle with all the time
as I attempt to get better at the craft. Heck, I've been teaching over a
dozen years and if there's one thing I keep telling myself it to "simplify,
simplify, simplify." Having meteorites to pass around was great. It might
have even be better to ask the people to come to the front of the room
and handle them. That way they get off their feet, move around and
tend to ask more questions. Another thing I've found useful is to walk
among the audience while talking and make good eye contact as I go.
Personal stories also even out the statistical aspect of things. I find
people will sit up and listen if they hear a funny or curious story
involving your own personal experience. It feels genuine and less
didactic.
Well, perhaps I've gone on too long here :-)but again, I thank you for
telling the group how it went. I have no doubt that should you have
more opportunities things will get easier.
Bob

> Hello list. It's very active today, I like that. Last night I gave a meteorite presentation at the San Diego Lapidary Society. It most certainly was not the first presentation I've ever given in front of people, but it was the first one about meteorites. Their general meeting was called to
order at 7pm, and they went about their business. You know, Robert Rules of order kind of stuff, and a raffle. It was quite pleasant actually. Most of the membership is quite a bit older than myself and my girlfriend. One kind older gentleman came over and told me great stories about the
meteorites he's found. Other members came up to me with three different rocks and asked if they were meteorites, unfortunately they were not and I had to be the one to break the bad news. I finally got to speak around 8:15pm and was quite nervous. I made up a packet of text that I wrote with
graphics, images, and other statistics and passed them out. I also brought about 50 specimens to show around and some moldavites and tektites. I really was geared up to give a really great talk, I had already visualized it in my head. So I introduced myself, and quickly warned them that:" I have
a tendency to go off on tangents and never come back. Oh, and I'm longwinded at times, so I'll be sticking to the script" So I was very nervous all of a sudden and started to stammer and forget the words and had to begin reading. I told them about the beginnings of the solar system, accretion,
asteroids, oxygen isotopes, fall statistics, identifying meteorites, classification with actual samples of each class, chemical make -up, Prospects for life elsewhere (alh84001, murchison, Allende,etc.), then I told them about the new large object that was just announced on Monday. Wow was I
imparting the goods on these people. Then I looked up and people were nodding off, the people in the back had already snuck out. I had been talking for about 45 minutes. I could feel that hollow pit in my stomach becoming an abysmal void and I was getting sucked down. I could feel the beads of
sweat forming on my bald head, my girlfriend was staring right at me. I wrapped in up quickly, and asked if there were questions. The few people who hadn't snuck out already had plenty of questions, and some were quite tricky. One woman right up front told me about her grandfather getting his
haystack burnt down by a meteor. I didn't know what to say. I blurted out "Really, how interesting!" It doesn't quite seem possible to me, but I couldn't tell her that. I think it was well past there bed time, because after I ended the talk they politely clapped and got the hell out of there. I
knew as soon as I sat down in the car what had gone wrong. I'm very hard on myself, very critical. My girlfriend told me what a great job I did, which is nice and I think she was trying to be nice. If you are this far down into this diatribe you've probably already got me pegged. I'm a nervous
talker, and I'm longwinded. Strike one. I hadn't pictured the right audience in my pre-visualization. Strike two. I had mistaken a meteorite talk with a meteorite lecture. Strike three. When I was falling asleep last night I couldn't help thinking that I could know so much more on the topic. I
now realize that all that information is not the important thing. The important thing is that you are entertaining the audience and creating an experience that they will remember. If your lucky they will learn something. I'm going to try and keep those things in mind next time. I'll try to be
more show and less tell. Hopefully others of you have had these types of experiences and would share them. Maybe some of you can offer some tips, or criticisms. Perhaps some of you will tell me to please not write long emails and send them to this list. Anyway, I hope sharing was a good idea.-
Edward
>
> Edward R. Hodges
> www.meteoriteonline.com
> IMCA # 4173
>
>
Received on Fri 11 Oct 2002 12:59:25 AM PDT