Choosing your own Audience.

It was a far different experience presenting down to only five people. Also, having to choose the five people you want to present to makes it pretty fun and interesting. I decided to pick a couple people that I know I could be comfortable around. I chose my boyfriend, Derek, my friend, Alex, my cousin, Joreen, my sister, Monica, and My Mother. I did this speech the same day we did our speeches on Friday and told them all to come over to my house because I needed them for one of my homework assignments. In this speech, what I did differently, was that I eliminated as much staring at my note cards and since having already performed the speech earlier in the day, I kinda had a lot of information stored that I could repeat it again without having to rely on note cards. So my note card usage went down to using only two and I made my intro a little different where I didn’t ask them if they liked video games, I just went on with my story. I believe I improved from the presentation I did on Friday because knowing that I’m already comfortable talking in front of these people gave me a boost of confidence knowing that they wouldn’t judge me so much as my peers in class. If I had done the speech differently, I would give my input more on violence and video games rather relying on other opinions I found from my source citations. The feedback I received was good. They told me that I sort of talk too fast and that I need to pace myself when I’m going from one idea to the next. They also said that I should practice a little more and maybe memorize a bit more information so that people know that I’m not just relying on my note cards and that I haven’t practiced at all. This exercise in my opinion is fun and useful because you get to have a little more fun presenting in front of people that you chose for yourself.

Self Evaluation Assignment #2

Another speech has past us by. I told myself this time around, I was going to nail it and give it all I got. I had practiced and read my material and told myself, what could go wrong? Many things actually, and things I wish I had done differently. This time around, I learned once again what could be done better in this speech and in the next one I’d be responsible for. My speech was on violence and video games. I was to explain its purpose on how it affects young children, studies that had been done, and also about the violent media.
Going into this speech, I had a lot of expectations for myself. I knew I’d be way more confident being in front of my classmates and my anxiety would no longer be there. Going up in front of everyone felt good and I knew my information. I believe that I did get to people when explaining how bad video games can be to young children as well as adults. Video games now are getting more amazing with graphics that they’re incorporating more violence and sexually explicit content in them and young teens and as well as people my age are thriving to purchase. I felt very very comfortable and confident. My only downfall was that the same week we had our speeches; I fell sick Sunday and was sick the whole week with a bad stuffy nose and sore throat. I tried my best to make it through the week and I’m proud that I did!
I know everyone has a little regret when looking back at the work they’ve done or performed. For myself, if I could go back and do it over again, I would first and foremost try and not be sick, because that really took me back a little with performing my speech the best I could, and I would concentrate more on my audience then my note cards. I was concentrating on my note cards more because with this speech, I had a lot of resources to tell the class and that’s why I had brought more note cards with me this time around because I could not memorize all of my resources. One goal I would have to improve the content of my next speech is to provide more input from myself rather than rely on my resources and what other people have said about it. One goal I have by improving the delivery in my next speech is to show more enthusiasm to the class to show that I’m having fun delivering my speech and that I do know my stuff!
With this speech and my last, there were many things that were different. For my first speech, I was more prepared and knew my information better than this one. With my second speech, I kept relying on my note cards because being sick, you lose a lot of focus and you’re tired and I just basically tried my best in delivering my speech that day. What was good with my second speech, I felt that the class enjoyed it more than I thought they hadn’t. What was bad for me was that I could feel that they knew I was relying on my note cards too much.
I’m all about distractions. I think the only distraction was looking at my note cards more than the audience. This wasn’t an improvement from my last speech because I remember from my last speech I didn’t look at my note cards as much as I did this time around. My eye contact this time around would be a five. I would grade myself with a B- because I know that I could’ve delivered this speech way better than I should have. I didn’t take the time to practice and getting sick wasn’t planned. The note cards being used frequently are a big disappointment for me. I used plenty of source citations this time around and I’m happy I didn’t leave them out this time around. I mentioned about six source citations throughout my speech. I would say, I was more happy with my last speech but this speech was better because I lost my anxiety and shyness level went away.

Chapter eleven - Understanding the Basics of Visual Design

In all of our speeches this semester, we are asked to bring something to show that ties in with our speeches. In the past two speeches that I have presented, I have used a power point to accompany my speech. Although using power point is a good way to further show the class your speech, I feel that when people have something else accompanied in their speeches, such as a poster, slides, or even people, they get really distracted and focus more on looking at the slides or poster rather than the audience in front of them. Having visual design in your speech is great, but there are advantages and disadvantages along with it. For example, having too much information on one slide can overwhelm and distract audience members. I’ll admit that sometimes I like to put attractive photos on my slides so that the audience could possibly look at that more than look at me. A good advantage in visual design is having close-up images because they often have a powerful impact because they’re perceived as personal and intimate. To balance out your speeches try using other types of visual designs, such as overhead transparency, flip chart and poster, or even a video!

Speech Buddy videos

Video 9.1 is about introductions. A good introduction goes a long way. We should get the audiences attention, preview your main points, and your purpose. We can introduce the speech by telling a story, humor, or in the video, they showed a girl talking a photo of the audience to get their attention on cameras. I will in my next speech try and make a humorous approach to my audience. Now 9.2 was about concluding your speeches. You should have a solid conclusion and leave your audience with a positive attitude. You should again review your main points and provide closure so that your audience isn't left confused or anything. Have a statement to conclude your closure. Here in video 13.1 A, Evan is presenting a speech on the universal language of techno music. Evan is great in giving eye contact and getting information out of an article. He has great transitions. He's always repeating techno in every part of his speech so that the audience knows that he isn't going off topic. In my next speech, I will try and have as much eye contact as him. In video 13.1 B, she is talking about Kodak Cameras. She has great eye movement and glances all around the audience. She isn't even using any notecards, which means she has practiced and practiced her speech very well. What's useful in her speech is that you can tell that she knows what she's talking about and in my next speech, I hope to not even use notecards anymore and just be on point in my speech. In video 13.1 Use it, she talks a little too fast for me. The lighting is really dark. She uses notecards in her speech and isn't as well prepared as the other girl in the video. She looks like she hasn't prepared a lot for her speech because it looks like shes reading off the notecards at all times.

Connecting your topic to your audience

It is great to connect your topic to your audience. Having it this way, we can get into people’s emotions and thoughts and they’ll enjoy our speech more. By using this technique, we can reduce the distance between our audiences and our audience can remember to pay attention and focus more intently on the topic. If our audience is unfamiliar with our topic, we should make a connection with them because they’ll really feel like we’re only speaking to them and that might make them more comfortable in opening up and answering questions when the speech is over. I found this useful because last time we had our speech and someone did the speech on 9/11, everyone could connect someway or somehow to it and everyone was hooked on listening to what they were talking about. I find this useful and interesting because everytime someone can relate to you in anyway, it makes the person feel more comfortable about the situation being talked about and they can give your feedback on it.

Introduce and Conclude!

There are many components that go into your introduction and as well as your conclusion. In chapter nine, it talks about the developing of your introduction and conclusion. In an introduction, you must start out by grabbing your audience’s attention. In my informative speech, which is about violence and video games, I am planning on grabbing all your attention by giving an example of how violence and video games have affected many children. I tend to make lengthy introductions, so, I’m going to try and shorten it up and use my time wisely. I’ll use my time wisely by only putting out my main purpose and points in the speech. Integrating presentation media is very good when presenting your speech. Visual materials capture the audience’s attention. I’m going to either bring video games for my visual materials or a powerpoint presentation. Also, don’t forget your main points otherwise the audience won’t understand what you’re trying to explain. In your conclusion, you must remember to review your main points, reinforce your purpose, and provide closure. The conclusion ties everything together so make sure not to include anymore-new information. To conclude your speech, end it with a quotation, or a dramatic statement.

Interactive Videos

I learned Supporting materials have advantages and disavantages. It's good to have a mix of supporting materials in your speech and try and not make them lengthy, otherwise your audience will be too distracted. Testimony can enhance credibility and work well in your speech and the source has a high degree of credibility. Examples are great to use in your speech and aren't generalizable. You can use supporting materials in your speech if they have credibility, reliability, and revelance. I also learned how to organize and put your speech together chronologically, summarizing, and concluding. Transitions are very important in your speech to stress the connection between two ideas. If we do not connect with our ideas in our speeches then everything will be jumbled up together and our audience will not enjoy our speech because of how crazy and hectic it may sound. We have to link effectively with transitions. We have to be careful when choosing our supporting materials because they may work in our speeches and they may not. Narratives only provide one view of the topic and if it's too long, it can distract our speech.

Concept - Testimony

We've all heard of testimonies somewhere. I've heard and seen a testimonial on television and also when people go door to door and want to tell you about a product they're selling and what to get your testimonial on it. They want your opinions or experiences related to the item being sold or to a particular topic. In the book, it says that usually speakers "use testimony from experts, celebrities, and laypeople. The book tells me of three different types of testimonials. The first one is called Expert Testimony. It relies or rests on the individual or group's qualifications related to that topic. The second Testimony is called Celebrity Testimony, relating to the person's fame or star power. The third is called Lay Testimony, which involves individuals who have experience with a topic but aren't experts or are well known. I found this concept useful because maybe the next time we have our speeches we can include testimonials from someone to make our speeches more interesting. In our first speeches, we could've added some testimonials from some people and that might have made our speeches more interesting and may have our audience more interested. I found it interesting because I didn't even think you could add a testimonal into our speeches. I might consider adding it in one of my speeches.

Facts and Statistics.

Facts and Statistics are highly affective in speeches to let our audience understand what we're getting at. Informative and Persuasive speeches are great to have facts and statistics in your speech. I find them most effective in a speech where if a person was to talk about a specific topic, let's say, health care, that requires a lot of facts to back up your arguments on how we can fix health care and how people are handling it in our country. Statistics comes in when we find research on how people are affected by health care and what's happening because of it. It is very affective in a persuasive speech because you're trying to prove your argument against someone and not having any facts or statistics would make your audience believe that you have nothing to back up what you're trying to say. In the first speech we did in class, statistics wasn't important because we were only informing people about our cultural artifacts and it didn't require too much facts or statistics on how many people use it or things like that. In our last two speeches, facts and statistics are going to be our number one factor in order for us to perform a well prepared, well researched speech or people will just assume that we made all this up and that we're plagiarizing.