Public Speaking

Posture

Face your audience.
Look up. If you can't look at their faces, look at different parts of the room.
Stand up straight with your feet shoulder-width apart. You will look confident.
Keep your hands as still as possible. If you are behind a table, put your hands on it to steady yourself.

TIP 1: Practice your speech while lying on your back. Put your hands on your belly muscles. Try to project your voice to the ceiling.

TIP 2: Practice your pronunciation. Go over the most difficult words and phrases many times. Practice how to breathe.

Take deep breaths.
Open your mouth, don't mumble.
Use your belly muscles, not your throat.
Make sure you are saying the ends of your words. Sometimes people run out of breath at the end of words and it makes them difficult to understand.
Use emphasis! Don't read like a robot!
Talk more slowly than you think you need to (when people are nervous, they tend to speak quickly).

Make the font big enough for you to read when it is on the table in front of you.
Make marks where you will take a big breath (so you can read the whole sentence.) Make double marks to give a pause to let your audience think.
Underline or circle words or ideas that you want to emphasize.
Write pronunciation notes over words you find difficult.
Highlight the beginning of sentences or main words where you get lost.
Leave yourself smiley-faces where you think it would be good to smile at the audience or other notes on body language.
Number your pages in case they get mixed up.

Can they hear you? How do you know? (Are they looking at you? Are they leaning in or cupping their ears?)
Do they seem to understand? (Do they look confused? Are they nodding or shaking their heads?)
If something seems to be wrong, what can you do to help your audience? (Ask!)

"What a great question!"
"Thank you for bringing that up!"
"I'm glad you said that!"
"So what you're asking is..." (rephrase their question to check if you understood)

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