In school, I was by no means the type of student who could simply view the slides as the professor talked through them and soak in all of the information. No way. That wasn’t me. I was the student who had a 3-inch thick notepad and a titanic collection of pens and pencils – my heavy artillery for the note-taking war I waged in every class. Although much of the onus is on the listener to discover their learning style and respond to presenters appropriately, the burden isn’t all theirs. Presenters need presentation training tips on engaging the 7 types of learners they could meet during the course of their presenting careers.
The Visual Learner
Approximately 65% of people are visual learners, so presenters of all kinds will definitely encounter this particular learning style on a frequent basis. The visual learner retains messages delivered through imagery and photos. If you put too much text on a slide and neglect to include a relevant image, you’ll lose this type of learner. The visual learner’s visual cortex is larger than his or her’s auditory cortex, therefore, this particular learner will handle visual information better than auditory information.
Presentation Training Tips:
When presenting to visual learners, pay close attention to the body language and gestures you are using, as these are cues your audience will pick up on to form their opinion of your message. Your slides should include visual representations of information like icons, graphs, and charts. Interchange these slides with slides involving big imagery and sparse text to underscore your main points.
The Auditory Learner
The next variety of learner that presenters are most likely to befriend is the auditory learner. These are the individuals who could close their eyes and clasp their hands together, relying solely on their hears to pick up the key points and their brains to process the information.
Presentation Training Tips:
An auditory learner will rejoice throughout a lecture-based presentation. They’ll go crazy over the narration of a compelling story. And they’ll appreciate the use of music to highlight certain sections of your deck. If you want to show your auditory audience some love, include discussion questions as part of your presentation. Involve them in your message in an intimate way and allow them to have their voices heard.
The Verbal Learner
I am a verbal learner. This means that I process information by reading and/or writing words. While I am sitting in a class, conference, or meeting, I have to be scribbling down notes at a million miles an hour.
Presentation Training Tips:
So, how does a presenter teach a learner like me? It’s as easy as providing scratch paper or a company-branded note-taking document prior to your presentation. Give your verbal learners something to write with and on and you will have the key to their hearts and minds.
The Physical Learner
Science has shown that physical learners comprise the third highest share of the population. This kind of learner will need to work with their hands or move their bodies at some point during your presentation. This doesn’t mean that you’ll need multiple intermissions for a jumping jack session or anything like that. However, there are a few steps you can take to keep this subset of your audience engaged.
Presentation Training Tips:
Every great presentation features interactivity. You’ve got to place opportunities within your deck for your audience to interact with you and with each other. It just has to happen if you want to make any real impact on others. For your physical learners, consider including an activity that permits your audience to pair up and role-play with one another. Or even bring a prop for them to inspect and hold in their hands. Anything to involve their sense of touch.
The Logical Learner
Aristotle championed the concepts of ethos, pathos, and logos – methods for persuading audiences. The logical learner connects with logos over all else. If you know you’ll have logical learners in your presentation audience, you understand that reason will be your best friend.
Presentation Training Tips:
To appease the logical learner, make sure you provide evidence to support any claim you make in your presentation. It doesn’t matter if you use a valid theory, a list of facts, historical data, analogies, or logic-based arguments. Spend time in the early stages of presentation preparation crafting your sub points and developing strong verification.
The Social Learner
Your social learners are probably also your extroverts. They won’t be content merely sitting through your presentation without talking to another person. Social learners need to brainstorm with other attendees and bounce ideas off of others in order to truly understand content.
Presentation Training Tips:
If you’ll have an extrovert-heavy audience, you’ll need to spread out a group activity or two during areas of your presentation. Give your audience a problem to tackle or issue to solve as groups, using ideas and information divulged in your speech.
The Solitary Learner
On the other hand, the solitary learner will prefer to digest your commentary by themselves. For these individuals, self-study is the most efficient way of remembering and retaining your message. The distraction of other people disrupts their thought process and hinders your presentation abilities.
Presentation Training Tips:
Concluding your presentation with a call to action paired with an educational leave-behind would be a perfect way to communicate with your solitary learners. With this asset, they’ll be able to go home, lock themselves in their study, and reignite their brains through questions and concepts included in the additional materials. This takes advantage of delayed retrieval practice – a teaching approach that has recently been found to be the most effective among students. Lead your audience to your online home as well to further strengthen the association between your message and your company, brand, or organization.
As a presenter, you will regularly run into visual, auditory, and physical learners. That’s just a given. So, be fully prepared for those specific audience segments. But, you can implement the other tactics described above based on your assessed audience needs. Do the work ahead of time to discover the core qualities of presentation attendees and insert elements as needed.
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