5 Ways to Memorize Your Presentation

Research? Check. Writing? Check. Presentation media development? Check. Now it’s time to start memorizing. Gulp. Memorization is one of the more daunting parts of speech preparation. But it’s important. When you memorize large portions of your presentation, great things can happen. You can choose and use the best words consistently. Your speech flows smoothly, allowing you to sound credible and prepared. And you are able to maintain great eye contact with your audience because you aren’t having to constantly look down at your notes. Following are 5 scientifically backed techniques for committing a presentation to memory. Use one or more of these to make that last daunting step so much easier. 1. Break the presentation down into smaller parts. “Chunking” is a practice for learning and memorizing information. Studies show that we learn more effectively if we can take larger things and break them into smaller bits of information. For example, phone numbers aren’t learned as a long string of numbers. Instead, we break them into sequences of three or four numbers to make them easier to remember. You could chunk your presentation into the introduction, each main point, and the conclusion. It’s easier to face a few smaller foes instead of one looming and formidable giant. 2. Write it down. Studies have proven that the act of writing something down can help you remember it better than if you simply typed it out. If you seem to be stuck in a practice rut and can’t seem to break through a memory block, grab a pen and some paper. The thought of writing out your whole presentation might seem cumbersome. But you don’t have to do this for the whole presentation. However, it’s a good technique for those parts that are more difficult to remember. 3. Give yourself breaks. […]

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