Poster Sessions

Posted on by Nattasit Dancholvichit

PURPOSE

To allow students space to 1) present and promote their individual or group work and 2) engage in one-on-one discussions with their audience. 

DESCRIPTION

Students create a visual, descriptive poster that summarizes the content of their project/study/assignment. Individuals or groups then assemble the posters in a combined session, during which audience members can matriculate among posters and speak directly with presenters. 

UNDERLYING EDUCATIONAL THEORIES

reflection, presentation, team-based learning 

PEDAGOGICAL BENEFITS 

  • Poster sessions save time and bandwidth by visually presenting the important points of the project, allowing presenters to focus more on intimate discussions with their audience. 
  • Poster sessions allow for multiple students/groups to present at once, which is useful for larger classes with numerous projects. 
  • Poster sessions support face-to-face engagement between the presenter and the audience, which allows students to practice social and communication skills. 
  • Questions and/or confusion from the audience can prompt students to reflect on, clarify, and build upon their own work. 
  • Students have the opportunity to interact with the work of their peers. 

STRATEGIES FOR IMPLEMENTATION 

(adapted from Bankston*) 

  1. Prepare specific guidelines for the poster session (e.g., how much time students will have to present, what type of material their poster should include, guidelines for visuals, etc.). Be sure to provide ample time for students to discuss one another’s work. 
  2. Consider whether specific resources will be needed for students to create posters. Will these be physical or virtual? Will they use classroom time or outside time to work on them? 
  3. Choose whether students will work collaboratively or individually.  
  4. Assign the poster topics to students/groups. 
  5. During the session itself, prompt for students to begin sharing. With larger groups, it can be helpful to assign a rotation so that some students make up the audience while others present. Consider inviting outside faculty, students, etc. to attend the session as well. 
  6. Support students in asking questions of presenters. Monitor presenters and ask conceptual questions as needed to prompt further discussion. 
  7. Prompt for individual or team-based reflection at the close of the session (e.g., through group discussion or written individually). What did students experience during the session? What were their reactions to audience questions? What did the experience teach them about their own work? 

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING 

*Bankston, K. (19-Jun 2021). Poster Session or Group Presentation. BetterLesson. https://betterlesson.com/strategy/307/poster-session-or-group-presentation?from=search. 

Requena-Carrión, J., Alonso-Atienza, F., Guerrero-Curieses, A., & Rodríguez-González, A. B. (2010, April). A student-centered collaborative learning environment for developing communication skills in engineering education. In IEEE EDUCON 2010 Conference, 783-786, IEEE.  

Stewart, T. (2008). Meta-reflective service learning poster fairs: purposive pedagogy for pre-service teachers. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 8(3), 79-102.