Public Speaking Category: Great Speeches (5-8 minutes)

• Speaking should be sincere, pleasant and convincing

• Steps can be taken at appropriate transitional points

• Gestures enhance

• Face should show involvement, concern, enthusiasm

• Goal: take a great speech from history and examine why it was great through students own analysis or sometimes expert support

• Attention-grabbing introduction

• Analysis should be interspersed

• Analysis: why speech is important, the impact of the speech, and what devices the speaker used (emotional appeals, logic, figurative language, repetition)

• 50-75% of the speech may be from the selected materials

• 20-50% must be analysis

• Speech should reflect:

  • Identification of the speech: author, occasion, date delivered

  • Purpose and impact when originally given

  • Student rationale of why this is an important message today

• Several speeches from one author, or several speeches around the same theme may also be used

• Practice Methods

  • Watch yourself in the mirror

  • Record yourself

  • Read it backwards

  • Go people watching and look for people who talk/move like your character

  • Insert your introduction into Google Translator and play it. How does it sound?