You will have 25 minutes, made up of a 15 minute presentation followed by 10 minutes for questions from the audience. Organisers will pair you with another research / practice seminar and the programme will show the order that you both present. A chair will be provided who will facilitate the session. The chair will introduce each speaker, give time reminders and manage the question and answer session. Usually you will be paired with someone with a similar topic or target audience.

The presentations usually involve talking with a slide show. It is important to practise this ahead of time so that you can keep within the time limits. Fifteen minutes is much shorter than you think.

You can present on your own or you can present with one or more colleagues.

The focus of the seminar could be a research project, either completed or in progress. The presentation might give an overview of the whole project or might focus on a small aspect. In 15 minutes you will not be able to give a detailed presentation about the background literature, theoretical framework, methodology, findings and conclusions. You will need to be selective about which aspects you highlight. When deciding on this you need to consider what you want delegates to take away from the presentation. If you choose to submit a paper for the proceedings you would be able to provide greater detail about the project.

If you are presenting about your practice you need to have a tight focus and include the context in which this practice is taking place. The context could include aspects like the learners involved, their age, the type of school, the socio-economic circumstances, local and national policies. You should provide some theoretical underpinnings for the practice, as well as its impact on learners. When designing your presentation, think about what you want delegates to take away from it. e.g. Would they want to replicate this practice in their own setting? Would they have enough information to be able to do this?

The research symposium is very similar to the research / practice seminars but this is designed for more complex presentations and multiple presenters. The total for the presentation is 35 minutes. This could be a single presentation with multiple presenters or a series of shorter, related presentations but it needs to make a coherent whole. It is your decision how the time is subdivided among presenters.

The research symposium is ideal for a group of people who have collaborated around a similar theme or who have conducted a large project together. It could be an opportunity to explore a research project and the practice related to it.

You will need to provide a chair for the symposium who acts as the host. They will organise the order of the presentation(s) and ensure each section keeps to time. They may introduce individual speakers and provide a thread to help demonstrate the coherence. At the end of the presentation the chair draws out the key themes and facilitates the 15 minute discussion between the delegates and the presenters.

Examples:

A researcher has facilitated a group of 3 teachers doing action research in their classrooms. The researcher acts as the chair and explains the context of the project and how the 3 presentations relate to each other.

A university research team has collaborated on a research project. One member of the team acts as the chair and sets the context. The rest of the team present individual aspects.

A school has been looking at an aspect of practice across the age range. A group of teachers present what they have found in their year groups. The school’s maths subject leader / head of department acts as the chair.

Interactive workshops are an opportunity to engage delegates in mathematical tasks. These could relate to a specific practice or resource. This engagement should lead to reflections on learning and teaching processes. As well as engaging in discussion with others on their table, there would usually be a wider discussion, perhaps as a plenary, allowing everyone to learn dialogically with others and share different perspectives. It is important that you have thought about your expected learning outcomes for the session.

The standard workshop is 50 minutes, allowing time for both the practical engagement and discussion. If you feel that your workshop needs longer it is possible to request a double-length session (1 hour and 40 minutes) but be aware that the number of these will be limited.

You will need to provide sufficient resources for all of the delegates at your session. If there is a maximum number of delegates this needs to be clearly stated in the abstract.

Round table discussions are an opportunity for delegates to explore an issue, policy or specific publication. You may have a piece of research or a proposal that you wish to seek input or advice about. You may be interested in gathering a wider range of views, outside of those you can currently access. Round table discussions are much more exploratory than seminars or symposiums. In order to facilitate the discussion the number of delegates will be capped at 16. In your abstract you should identify if there are any types of delegate (e.g. professional role and / or age phase) you are particularly seeking.

Round table discussions would often involve a pair or small team of presenters. One of these will act as the chair to manage the flow of the discussion, encourage involvement from all participants and ensure the session keeps to time.

The round table might start with a brief presentation (5 minutes) or summary of the issue before inviting delegates to discuss the issues. You may structure this around key points or questions for the delegates. The majority of the 50 minute session should be spent in discussion. You may choose to finish the session by trying to summarise what has been discussed.

Any materials to be discussed will need to be provided. It is helpful that these are available to delegates before the session so they have the chance to go through and reflect upon them ahead of time. If the materials are not open access, the presenter will need to find legal ways of making them available.

Present your research project or practice ideas diagrammatically on an A1 or A2 poster (for physical display and digitally for uploading to the conference app). You will need to arrange for your poster to be printed and brought to the venue.

A poster is a visual story of your research; it should be eye-catching and with key messages clearly visible. A poster does not need to follow a traditional research paper structure; it’s important to think about your audience, what they will find interesting and how you can guide them to engage with your work.

Your poster must include: a title (matching your submission); and your name, institution and email address. Your poster might include: coloured sections which are clearly labelled with sub-headings and/or numbered to guide the attention of the reader, or arrows to lead the reader through your story; some short paragraphs of text that can be read from 1 or 2 metres away; appropriate pictures or visual representations of data; simplified text in a table or diagram such as a flow chart; a bibliography; a QR code to access further information; and your institution’s branding. If you are collaborating with others, you could take responsibility for different sections of the poster, or split the area between you and use your section to communicate about your work.

Here are some examples of posters created by the BCME organisers:

Many universities have useful guides for students and staff, and these can be located through a search for ‘academic poster guidance on creating’, or similar.

Posters will be displayed throughout the two-day conference but you are not expected to be with your poster at all times. Delegates can contact you via email for more information.

During the dedicated poster exhibition sessions on each day, you are encouraged to be with your poster as delegates move around the room to view all the posters on display. Hopefully your poster attracts interest and delegates come across to look at it in more detail. These exhibition sessions provide an opportunity for you to discuss your work, get feedback and interact with interested delegates, if you wish to. It can be useful to prepare a brief (1 or 2 minute) overview of the work that you can say when you are approached, or consider some questions that you could ask if you want feedback on a specific aspect of your work.

Here are some pictures from poster exhibitions to give a sense of how the session will ‘look’.

There are many programmes which can be used to design your poster, including Publisher, PowerPoint, Adobe and Canva. Your institution may provide a template.

If you use PowerPoint to design your poster, in Design go to Slide Size and select Custom slide size, then input 42.0cm x 59.4cm (A2) or 59.4cm x 84.1cm (A1). You can choose to design your poster in either a landscape or portrait orientation. The smallest font size for good visibility is 36 points. Consider the visual impact of the poster and accessibility when choosing images, background, contrast, font type, size and colour. Using gridlines or guides (through the View menu) can be helpful in lining up elements. Posters can usually be printed from a .pdf or .png file; check with your printer.