Presentation Jitters


I have always had a hatred for public speaking and presentations in general, so I dreaded the assignment. I studied up on my paper, noted, and highlighted it beyond recognition. I remade my slides over and over again up until 30 minutes before class, even though I had already submitted twice before. This didn’t help me relax my nerves or reduce my fear of messing up in front of the whole class. Because it was in front of a lot of course 20s who knew biology and could ask detailed and complex questions it made me more nervous that I wouldn’t be able to answer any questions and embarrass myself. I didn’t have the chance to present in front of the Communications Lab like I wanted and was nervous that I wasn’t giving a good presentation.

All in all, I went into this presentation with the worst jitters, I ever thought imaginable. However, when I got up there, I stopped jittering albeit still nervous. Maybe I couldn’t register the jitters, because I was nervous. But before I knew it the presentation was done and I said most if not all of what I wanted to say and didn’t have too many hiccups. Then came the questions and I realized that I was relatively prepared for them, even though there were some specifics that I didn’t know or look into prior to the presentation.

I realized that what got me through the presentation was that, I read my papers so many times that I could recite it. Maybe not that dramatic, but I felt more comfortable with the material because it was something that I was familiar with and was very interested in. I have learned with this project, that sometimes nerves can be crucial, because it motivated me to almost over prepare for the project. Sometimes the jitters aren't so bad, unless it's from caffeine....

 -Cathy

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