How to Give a Really Bad Math Talk

There are numerous excellent papers, notes, and blog posts on the subject of giving a good math talk, such as [H, K, G, BA].However, comprehensive advice on giving a bad math talk is much harder to come by.This paper is intended to fill that gap.Many years of both listening to and delivering quite bad math research talks and really bad undergraduate lectures made me a true expert on the subject.In this note I want to share some of the valuable advice that I accumulated with you, who may possibly have had less experience in giving bad talks than I did.My advice is centered around the following five key aspects

Authors

Publication Details

Journal
Notices of the American Mathematical Society
Published
2025-02-26
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1090/noti3123
Primary Topic
Innovative Teaching and Learning Methods
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00
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article

How to Give a Really Bad Math Talk

Evgeny Shinder
Notices of the American Mathematical Society
Innovative Teaching and Learning Methods
article

How to Give a Really Bad Math Talk

Evgeny Shinder
article en

Abstract

There are numerous excellent papers, notes, and blog posts on the subject of giving a good math talk, such as [H, K, G, BA].However, comprehensive advice on giving a bad math talk is much harder to come by.This paper is intended to fill that gap.Many years of both listening to and delivering quite bad math research talks and really bad undergraduate lectures made me a true expert on the subject.In this note I want to share some of the valuable advice that I accumulated with you, who may possibly have had less experience in giving bad talks than I did.My advice is centered around the following five key aspects

Notices of the American Mathematical SocietyVol. 72(03)
Quality Education
Openalex Percentile: Top 97%
Innovative Teaching and Learning Methods
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How to Give a Really Bad Math Talk — Evgeny Shinder · Notices of the American Mathematical Society (2025) | TGRS Research Map | TGRS