Self-Evaluation

I don't know about you guys, but I felt a lot better once that speech was over. And I totally practiced. My voice actually got a little hoarse from practicing all day at work, and I even made a coworker or two listen to me. By the time I left for class, man I tell you I had that speech DOWN. I was barely looking at my cards, and not one "um" would escape my lips as I confidently spoke to the four walls of my office. Oh yeah baby.

And then right before we started the class as a whole reminded the teacher that the speech was supposed to be 3-4 minutes long. And I had prepared for an 8 minute speech. Suddenly my oh-so-perfect speech was twice as long as it need to be, and I had signed up to go first. I did some mental juggling and rearranging, took a deep breath, and went for it. And then I lost my place after I skipped a section I figured I could live without, so I glanced at my cards to figure out where I was, and they were TOTALLY WRITTEN IN NORWEGIAN! I don't even speak Norwegian! I flipped through my cards, desperately looking for one word that I recognized, one word in a familiar language...all for not. But I powered through. And then it was done. Thank goodness.

My cards somehow transformed back into English once I sat back down. Imagine my surprise. And my frustration.

All in all, I think I did an okay job at delivering my speech. It wasn't amazing, but it wasn't God awful. I most definitely felt more comfortable in front of the class this time than for our culture speech. I don't know if it had to do with getting to know everyone better online, or if it was due to the class size, but it was a good thing.

If I had to do it over again, I would check, double check, and then triple check the time requirement. And then just read over the assignment every day to make sure I was doing the right one. Also, since I have a tendency of going over on my time, I think I would prepare for a three minute speech and then count on me taking longer to do it in front of the class. And then practice the shi* out of it.

As far as goals for improving content...well, I'd like to pick something I am interested in for this next speech, so that I can speak with ease and share my enthusiasm for the topic. Enthusiasm always makes mundane stuff seem more interesting, which will improve the content. My goal for my delivery this upcoming speech is to not mutter one single solitary "um" throughout the entire thing.

I thought my eye contact was okay. Maybe about a 6. Some of the feed back from the class said I had great eye contact, and some said I needed more. I think I fixate an particular people and perhaps ignore others. I will try to be more inclusive next time. I can't discriminate with my eye contact.

I think I mentioned at least three source citations. I had six actually (backup in case others failed!) But I think that one of my primary sources was cut out when I was trying to shave time off of my speech.

Overall, I would have given myself a B. Maybe a low B. If I was super cranky, probably a C. I know I looked at the cards to much once I got lost, I admitted to BEING lost, my voice was probably shaky, and I know I said "um" a few times. But I also think I had a good attitude about the whole thing, and I did try my best. I really wanted to do well! So yeah, I'd say a B.

I'd like to thank you all for all of your kind responses to my speech. It's nice to be part of such a positive environment. And it certainly makes it easier to get up in front of you guys and talk about stuff like domestic violence. See you all in a month!

Gimme the Facts

Facts are a fabulous thing to include in your speech. The texts makes an excellent point right off the bat that "When you include facts in a speech, you're not limited to your own observations. You accept other's observations as well." I feel that when you begin to include facts into your speech you establish a lot more credibility for yourself than you would otherwise. Facts (and their close friend Statistics) demonstrate that you know what you are talking about, that you have researched what you are talking about, and that people can count on you as an authority on the subject.

Facts and statistics also break up other methods of support by appealing to the logical (logos) side of the audiences mind. It is really easy togo overboard with facts and statistics though. It is best to use them here and there, but not overwhelmingly, so that they can still offer the "punch" needed to grab the audiences attention. If you use them too frequently, then your audience gets bored and your punches are not effective at all.

Facts and Statistics

Facts and statistics are an incredibly useful tool when giving a speech. They can add credibility to what you are saying, and they can effectively drive home your point when you use proper fact/statistic placement. Facts and statistics appeal to an audience's logical side, which can create an effective juxtaposition with appeals to the audiences mental side. I think that facts and statistics are best used as a kind of punctuation throughout the speech. You want to use them as the Bang! Bam! Zowee! Parts of your speech. They are like exclamation points; totally useful when you use them in the right spot, but when you have a whole paragraph of nothing but exclamation points you lose the oomph that that particular form of punctuation provides. When you inundate your audience with cited facts and statistics, you audience may very well lose interest. I think it is best to appeal to your audience through a variety of methods , such as examples, testimony, definitions, and stories. Hitting your audience with a rainbow of these tools is sure to keep your audience engaged throughout your speech. Hooray!

Speech Buddy Videos for Chapters 7 & 8

I found the speech buddy videos and the text particularly useful this week. I liked learning about the different types of supporting materials because I had never really given them much thought before. In all of my years of essay writing, it's always get your thesis, find your main points, find the supporting details - examples, quotes, statistics - apply to main points, bring points back home to the thesis, and conclude. Wham! Bam! Thank you Ma'am. ( Okay, I wish that my essay writing was that clean cut, but essentially that's how it works, just without the weeks of procrastination and then the week of free writing as I desperately try to get out of my stress-induced writer's block.) What I liked about Chapter Seven was the idea of organizing my supporting materials in order to appeal to the audience in a variety of ways. I liked learning about methods that will elicit emotional responses vs. logical connections. It seems to me that if you hit all of these points and stimulate the emotional and logical facets of your audience in an efficient manner, then you can potentially have the audience in the palm of your hand. Try not to go mad with power now...

Chapter 8 appealed to me because I am hopelessly busy, but I dream of one day being perfectly organized. I had never thought of different patterns of organization before. I think that mainly I had been using chronological and topical methods in previous academic jaunts. I am looking forward to incorporating new methods into future works. I keep having this sneaking suspicion that this whole public speaking class is going to improve my English and writing skills as well. Weird.

Also, if anyone want to dummy for a joint lock for my demonstration speech, do let me know. It will be fun! I promise!

Understanding Your Demographic

This chapter highlighted the importance of understanding your audience before delivering your speech. Knowing your demographic before your speech is going to be profoundly helpful with regards to your ability to relate to your audience. For instance, if you are giving a speech on the benefits of vegetarianism, you are going to approach the topic differently in Dallas Texas from what you would do in Berkeley, California. In Texas you have have to try a more persuasive approach, along with focusing heavily the basics of vegetarianism, why it's a god idea, and using statistics to bring the idea home for the audience. In Berkeley you would be preaching to the choir, so you would likely be able to skip the basic concepts since the majority of the audience would likely already be on board, and you would be able to take less of a persuasive approach and more of a "stroking the ego" approach.
Understanding your demographic will not only give you the ability to realte your information to your audience in an effective manner, but it will save you from a very deep and lasting embarrassment. I would hate to have to not done my research and wind up giving a speech on the wonders of dairy products for health and vitality to a Lactose Intolerance Anonymous group, or something similar. I run into enough instances where I would love to put my foot in my mouth without creating a scenario in which I give a speech directed to the opposite demographic from those to whom I am speaking.

The Importance of Audience Analysis and Adaptation

Audience analysis and adaptation are fundamental to speech preparation. One should consider the audience in the initial planning stages while brainstorming for a topic. Thinking about the audience from the get go will allow for the speaker to relate better to the audience, and to adapt their speech to do so. For instance, it would be in poor taste to give a speech on the importance of dance to American culture to a group of multiple sclerosis patients, or to give a Pro Life speech to a Pro Choice audience. Proper consideration to the Audience can be the difference between a great presentation and an exercise in futility.

In addition to making sure that you are choosing a topic that your audience will not be vehemently against, audience analysis will allow for the speaker to adapt their speech in a manner which allows for the audience to relate. I know that if I personally cannot relate to someone giving a presentation I quickly lose interest. It is important to make your audience care.

This chapter reminded me of an article I read about about the idea of feedback. The article was about a particular stretch of road where drivers had a tendency to speed. Speed limit signs didn't seem to work, and the city and the local police were scratching their heads as to what to do. Eventually someone came up with the idea of feedback, and thus those fun little off the road signs that tell tell you how fast you are going came into being. Research found that when people were simply told to do the speed limit, not much thought was given to it; however once feedback was provided in the the form of a sign that showed people how fast they were going, people were able to see how it related to them and finally slowed down. You can apply the same concept here with the idea that saying "24% of the people in this room have an STD," is a lot more powerful than "1 out of every 4 Americans will contract an STD in their lifetime." Just saying 1 out of every 4 Americans is an obscure thought for people,and it is really easy not to include themselves in that statistic. But when you bring the information home it has a habit of smacking people in the face and grabbing their attention.

With regards to my demonstration speech, I think (or I like to anyway) that I have chosen a topic that will be pretty easy to relate to the audience. The majority of our class is female, and I am fairly passionate about the need for women to learn self-defense. There are a lot of statistics available regarding assault,assault on women, where it can come from,and what you can do about it. I think everyone, men and women alike, have had moments throughout their lives where they have been afraid, or questioned their safety. I know I have, many and many a time. I am looking forward to sharing my knowledge on the subject with the class.

Also, I have need of a volunteer, and the young woman with the passion for disc golfing offered to do that for me the last time we met in class. I'm sorry, I can't remember your name, but can you leave me a message so that we can connect if you are still interested? THANK YOU!

Thoughts on the "Drinking" and "Light Pollution" Videos

The video on light pollution seems to only be about 30 seconds long . . . which is only enough time to watch the introduction. Did everyone else experience this, or was it just me for whatever reason. It was a bummer too, not only because it gave me less to review but light pollution is a subject I am interested in. Going off of what I saw, I thought her opening sounded well organized and that perhaps she had a rather large interest in the effects of light pollution as well. I did think that she looked at her notes rather often, but I wonder if that is to be expected with longer speeches. I sure hope that it is more acceptable! Also, I thought that the quality of the recording was very poor, which in itself wasn't her fault at all but it did make me disinclined to watch the video.

The very first thing that I noticed about the "drinking" speech even before I hit the play button was that the "about" paragraph refers to the speaker first as "Matthew," and then as "Anthony." WHO IS THIS GUY? I suppose I will just call him "Manthony." First, I thought that Manthony had a lot of good points. I would imagine that drunk driving and the effects of alcohol in the body and on human metabolism is one of the most available research subjects out there, so I am sure that he had a huge wealth of statistics and research data to draw from in writing his speech. That said, I didn't care for it too much. i thought the opening bit with the retching noises off to the side of the room, while certainly an attention-getter, was a bit crass. He also makes this weird sucking noise with his mouth in between thoughts, and that noise is one of my pet peeves. I have one person in my life that makes that sound all the time, and it drives me nuts. I really hope that I never wake up one morning to find out that I have been making the same noise my entire life, because that would totally kill a piece of my self-righteousness.

I did not find Manthony to be terribly engaging. It felt more like he was reading words off of paper than giving a speech. I think that could just be the way that his nerves manifest themselves. I know a lot of people with stage fright that use a monotonous "whatever" attitude as a defense mechanism. I also think that it would have been helpful to set up his notes on the projector beforehand so that moving to and from the projector would have been less awkward and not disrupted the flow of the speech so much.

I learned a lot from Manthony and his "Drinking" speech, even if a lot of it was more along the lines of what not to do. I definitely want to be prepared for this next speech that we give, and I want to practice it in front of people so that I don't have to depend on my notes as much. And so I remember to slip in my references. Any speeches that we give in the future I will definitely have any kind of visual aids set up ahead of time so that I can move easily between speaking and emphatically gesturing towards my aid. And I may make do without graphic sound effects. Unless they are dinosaur sound effects, which are appropriate for any situation.

Using Library Resources

I thought it was really cool that the book highlighted using the library before mentioning nay other types of resources. I feel like libraries are being more and more phased out as the internet continues to take over our lives. Libraries are a fantastic resource with which everyone should become more familiar. I get the impression that a great deal of high school students and some of the newer college students have no idea just how useful a library is, or even how to use it properly.
Libraries don't just have books, although books are an incredible resource in themselves. They also have a hefty selection of journals, magazines and newspapers, which are available for your perusal for free. The same journals, magazines and newspapers aren't always available for free viewing online. Libraries also have a fantastic reference sections, which will contain maps, atlases, encyclopedias, dictionaries, and various print indexes. Often libraries will have multimedia resources as well, so you can access audio and video records as well as image libraries.
Also, with libraries you can verify the source. While there are plenty of legitimate online resources from where you can pull information, there are even more completely bogus sites that do not have any credibility whatsoever. Plenty of people simply post their thoughts and opinions on the internet, and no matter how will articulated they might be, they are still a poor source of information. We should truly all take the time to get to know our libraries a little better.

Chapter Six Speech Buddy videos, and the wonder of terrestrial pulmonate gastropods.

It seemed to me that Chapter Six did not have much in the way of videos to watch. There appeared to be only one "informative" video along with two speech presentations. The informative video mostly seemed to reiterate the content of the chapter. Understand what you know and do not know about your topic so that you can research appropriately. Use your library - it is there specifically as a research tool for you to use. A well-researched topic certainly does make for a smoother speech presentation. I remember having to give a research presentation on the fine intricacies of photosynthesis in a high school biology class, and it going terribly because I didn't have a firm grasp on the topic. So I can totally get behind the idea of thoroughly researching your speech topic.

I will say that I was completely enamored with Shaura's informative speech "Terrestrial Pulmonate Gastropods." Strangely enough, I am a rather big fan of slugs also, so not only did i enjoy the subject material, but I thought her speech to be rather witty as well as informative. I feel like I got more out of watching that video than the straight informative video. you could tell that Shaura enjoyed her topic, and I really appreciated the clever word play that seemed to flow very easily from her. Plus the title of her speech is beyond awesome. Shaura is my new Speech Hero, and I am hoping that I come off as comfortable as she did for our demonstrative speech.

Interview Experience

I am afraid that my only interview experience comes from being the interviewee. My little sister interviewed me as part of her final project for her Sociology degree at Sonoma State. I believe she interviewed eight people about various aspects of body image. She was very organized about the whole business and had a great many questions prepared ahead of time, and she also asked follow up questions that were based on the answers that I had given. being that it was my sister, and the interview was conducted in my bedroom, I was pretty comfortable with the situation, and I was able to give in depth answers rather easily. The interview lasted about an hour if I recall. I know that she had to transcribe each interview for her thesis, which took forever and a day, but it seemed like she gathered a great deal of helpful data from the process.

I was also interviewed by one of the local news stations when my high school (waaaaaay back when) had an outbreak of meningitis. We needed to get permission slips signed in order to take an oral vaccination, and I had forgotten my slip, so by the time my father came to the school the news team was there covering the story. They interviewed both my dad and I about the outbreak and how we felt about it. Then they asked if they could film me taking the pill, and I agreed. They put the camera RIGHT UP IN MY FACE as I tried to down the pill with some water, but I got so nervous and self-conscious that I choked on the pill, shot water out of my nose and spilled the water from my cup all over my face, and turned beet red in the process. And they totally used that clip.

All in all I think I preferred the interview with my sister.

Developing a Thesis Statement

I enjoyed Chapter Four quite a bit. It made me realize that preparing a speech is pretty much the exact same thing as preparing an essay. And in a way I kind of like essays. It feels really good to deliver a well-articulated point and give the reader something to think about. Language is an art form after all, and the ability to transpose your thoughts into either the written or spoken word coherently is truly a thing of beauty.

Central to any good speech or essay is a well-developed thesis statement. The book defines a "thesis" as "a single declarative sentence that captures the essence or central idea of a speech." Basically, the theses is a concise statement that tells the audience the point of the speech. Having a clear thesis statement is just as critical to speech as it is to an essay; without a good thesis, your topic can easily turn into a seemingly endless quagmire that you are desperately trying to navigate. A strong thesis will help to keep your thoughts organized as well as provide a consistent flow to your work.

I find that a great way to build an essay, or speech for that matter, is to start with a stream of consciousness brainstorm session. I just write out everything that comes into my head about a given topic. After a while I go through everything I have written down and I try to see how it all relates to each other. That's usually when I develop a rough thesis. After I have an idea of what my thesis is going to be, I decide what my main points will be and think about how I will relate them back to the thesis statement. Always, ALWAYS be able to relate your points back to your thesis. If any of the supporting evidence for your main points cannot be related back to your thesis statement then you are wandering off topic, which simply will not do! My thesis statements will usually undergo several revisions as I work on my essay. I will al;so bust out the thesaurus to determine whether there is a better way of saying what it is that I am trying to say. A good thesaurus can be your best friend.

Speech preparation got a lot less daunting once I made the association with essay formating. I am a reasonable wordsmith when I get down to it, and now that I realize that I can use my essay skills in speech preparation I am feeling a lot more confident. Hooray!!!

Thoughts on "Intro to Jessica" and Other Speech Buddy Videos

I thought that the best information that was relayed in the Speech Buddy videos was the idea of narrowing your topic down, and even tailoring it to your audience.  There were really good points made about ideas like, "If your speech is going to be delivered early in the morning, maybe a really heavy topic isn't going to go over so well," and other points that I had never really considered.  It certainly is interesting to learn all of the subtle nuances that come along with speech making.

I was really impressed with the "Ribbon" speech; holy cow she only had 15 minutes to prepare for that!  Does anyone else think that that is a remarkably short amount of time to get a speech together?  No lie, just the thought of it makes my insides do a little jig.  I mean...the thought of challenging myself by having only fifteen minutes to prepare for a speech to be delivered in front of real human being is exhilarating and leaves me breathless with anticipation.  (Win!)

I also thought it was encouraging to notice that all of the speeches given in the videos were not delivered flawlessly, and yet they still had great impact. The speakers managed to convey an air of professionalism as well as a sense of being thoroughly educated in the topic at hand, despite the occasion hiccup.  Which made me feel SO MUCH BETTER.  Just noticing that their (slight, tiny) errors did not make me think less of them made my anxiety lessen.  Just a bit.  I also felt as though I related to the speakers better after noticing the occasional blip; I would think "I DO THAT TOO!!!" and instantly feel a small bond with the speaker whom I have never met.

Could it be that a small part of me is looking forward to this upcoming culture speech?  Surely not...  :)