I really enjoyed reading Chapter 10 on preparing and
presenting public speeches. I have been
dreading taking speech class my entire college career based on the fact that I
don’t want to get up in front of a bunch of strangers and be the center of
attention. The chapter had a lot of
great useful information such as how the introduction of your speech should
grab the audience’s attention and how the conclusion should summarize what you
have talked about and leave the audience with a feeling of closure. I think I could have benefited more with how
to deal with the anxiety during your speech, ways to help if your mind goes
blank, perhaps what you should focus your eye contact on during the speech, how
to prepare for questions at the end, etc.
Or perhaps how to take a speech from being a memorized, rehearsed speech
to making it more personal so it’s like you are telling a story instead of
reading it from note cards.
Hi Missy,
ReplyDeleteIf you have public speaking issues I suggest taking public speaking with Donna Knifong. She is awesome, and although she may seem tough, she tries to make speeches painless. It's amazing how fast time goes if you can just get past the first 30 seconds of tummy butterflies. She really pushes for extemporaneous speaking, but if you must use note cards, she only dings you if you are continually "reading".
Public speaking is scary, there is no way around it. But the more you do it the easier it gets...not to mention there is a friendship that occurs in a class over the semester, and it makes the time go faster!
Preparing public speeches are one of my fears as well. It is very hard for me to get up in front of people and talk to others, especially a room of people who are just staring at you. I don’t mind talking to people or giving instructions to people, especially being a cheerleader and a trainer at work, but when it comes to talking about your beliefs or persuading people it kind of it difficult. I know there are plenty of different speeches that set the tone, but when it comes to seriousness or on issues I find that a little difficult. I can definitely say public speakers have major guts.
ReplyDeletei actually enjoyed chapter 10 as well, along with this class i was also taking visual communications along with group communications and in both of those classes i had at least 2 presentations. this chapter helped me prepare for those speeches. i actually refereed back to this chapter multiple times throughout the semester to help me with my presentations. and considering i got A's on all my presentations i think that the information i took from the chapter helped. also to go along with the first post i have taken Donna before for communications and she is amazing!! totally makes you feel comfortable doing a speech and makes it seem like its a piece of cake!
ReplyDelete