Include multimedia components (e.g., graphics, images, music, sound) and visual displays in presentations to clarify information.
Common Core State Standards, Grade 6, Speaking & Listening · Read it at the source · Checked October 14, 2026
What SL.6.5 Means in Plain English
Sixth graders add graphics, photos, music, sound and displays like charts or timelines to a presentation when they make the information clearer. A photo of the blacktop labeled 128°F beside grass labeled 89°F explains a heat finding faster than a paragraph could. A flame GIF explains nothing.
Fifth graders (SL.5.5) added graphics and sound when they developed a main idea or theme. Sixth grade names images and music too, and narrows the test to one question: does this make the information clearer? Seventh grade (SL.7.5) uses media to clarify claims and stress key points.
SL.6.5 I Can Statements
I can choose a visual that shows what my words can’t.
I can cut a chart down to the numbers that matter.
I can use sound or music only when it carries information.
SL.6.5 Worked Example
One finding, two slides, and what the speaker says over each. Only one makes the finding clearer than words alone.
Prompt
Your group measured surface temperatures around the school at noon on a September day. Plan the one slide that shows your main finding, and what you will say while it is on screen.
Not YetSlide: the title “HEAT!!!” over a cartoon sun in sunglasses and a flame GIF, with all twelve temperatures we measured listed underneath in small type. Script: “So here’s our data. It was really hot. You can read the numbers.”The cartoon and the GIF decorate. The twelve numbers are real information, but nobody past the second row can read them, and the speaker leaves the audience to find the point alone.
Meets the StandardSlide: one photo of the blacktop next to the grass field, with three temperatures labeled right on the surfaces: blacktop 128°F, grass 89°F, shade under the oak 81°F. Script: “Same sun, same minute, forty-seven degrees apart. Dark blacktop soaks up sunlight. Grass and shade don’t. That gap is our whole finding.”Three numbers instead of twelve, placed on the surfaces they came from, so the audience sees the difference before hearing it. The speaker explains the photo while it is up.
Moves to Use
Choose media that shows what words can’t: a place, a scale, a sound.Cut a data display down to the few numbers that make the point.Label the visual right where the eye lands, not in a legend.Use music or sound only when hearing it is the information.Talk about each visual while it is on screen.
Common Mistakes with SL.6.5
The data dump
A twelve-row table in small type, read aloud line by line
Try this: Limit each data display to the three numbers that carry the point, and put the full table on a handout.
Music as wallpaper
A song playing under the whole talk, so the speaker competes with it
Try this: Allow music or sound only when listeners need to hear it, and have the presenter say first what to listen for.
Slides and talk out of step
The screen shows the map while the speaker has already moved on to the results
Try this: Rehearse with a partner who calls out whenever the words and the screen stop matching, then reorder the slides to fit.
Classroom TimerFree ToolRehearse each talk against the clock, clips included, and cap any sound or video at twenty seconds so the speaker keeps the floor.Rehearsal20-second clips