Team Project Slides

Due: November 6 by 11:59 PM ET · 10% of course grade

1 Purpose

Your team will present its Team Project to the class. This assignment is the slide deck. The in-class presentation itself is graded separately (100 points) on November 6 or November 13; its rubric is below.

Being a strong presenter is a skill you will use throughout your academic and professional career, whether you are defending a thesis, pitching an idea, or presenting research at a conference.

2 The Presentation

  • Length: 15 minutes per team, about 12 minutes of presentation and 3 minutes of questions. We will hold you to time, so rehearse with a timer.
  • Every team member presents, for roughly equal time. Plan your hand-offs.
  • Questions come from the class, the Team Leader, and the instructor, and may be directed to any team member.
  • Aim for about 10–15 content slides, plus a title slide, a references slide, and the Verification Form slide.

A typical structure:

Track A: Inside a Physics Lab Track B: Measure Tech
The research question and why it matters The question and why it is interesting
How the group answers it: apparatus, methods, or models Method 1 and Method 2: how you did them
What you saw and learned on your visit Your results, with uncertainties
The people: their paths into physics Do your methods agree? Why or why not?
How a first-year can get involved What went wrong, and what you would change

3 What to Submit

  • The team’s final slide deck, submitted as a PDF named Team-Name-Slides.pdf.
  • All teams submit by November 6, including teams presenting on November 13.
  • One team member uploads the PDF to Canvas. Every member is responsible for confirming that it was submitted.

4 Expectations

Analyze. Understand the assignment and your audience: your classmates. Define terms they may not know.

Show your experience. Your deck must include the evidence described in the Team Project: your own dated photos or video of your team doing the work, and a photo or scan of the signed Verification Form as the last slide.

Research. Use reliable sources and cite them on a references slide. Label any image that is not your own with its source.

Plan. Give the presentation a clear beginning, middle, and end. Every slide should support the main point.

Design. Keep text short; slides support what you say rather than repeat it. Use figures and images where they explain something better than words. For Track B, show your data in a plot with labeled axes and units.

Practice together. Rehearse the full presentation as a team, out loud, at least once. This is how you catch gaps, redundancies, and rough hand-offs between speakers.

Present. Every team member presents. Speak to the audience, make eye contact, and never read your slides.

5 Rubric

5.1 Slides (100 points)

Criterion Points
Content. The question, approach, and findings are clear and accurate, and explained at the level of a first-year physics student. 30
Evidence of first-hand work. Your own dated photos or video of the team doing the work, and the signed Verification Form. 30
Organization. Clear beginning, middle, and end; each slide supports the main point. 15
Design. Readable text, little of it; figures and plots that are labeled and explain something. 15
Sources. Background and outside images are cited on a references slide. 10
Total 100

5.2 Presentation (100 points)

Criterion Points
Delivery. Speakers talk to the audience, make eye contact, and do not read the slides. 30
Teamwork. Every member presents a fair share; hand-offs are smooth. 20
Questions. Any team member can answer questions about any part of the project. 20
Timing. The presentation fits in the 15-minute slot. 15
Process. The team completed its check-in with the Team Leader by October 23. 15
Total 100

6 Submission Checklist

  • The deck has a title slide with the team name, the track, and all members’ names.
  • The deck includes our own dated photos or video of the team doing the work.
  • The last slide is a photo or scan of the signed Verification Form.
  • Sources are cited on a references slide.
  • The team has rehearsed the full presentation together, with a timer.
  • The deck is submitted as a single PDF by November 6.

7 Helpful Resources