Speech Presentations Blog

 Speech Presentations Blog

Public Speaking is something that we do more often than we think. For example, when we speak in group settings with friends, this is considered to be a form of public speaking. I believe that everyone should take at least one speech class because you will always use what you have learned in real life situations. No matter what you want to major in, public speaking will benefit you, in both your career and personal life. We communicate with people everyday and this class helps us find ways to communicate effectively.  This is my second speech class that I take and I was very excited. I plan on majoring In Mass Communications, therefore everything that I learn in this class will help me excel in my career. Professor Sinkoff is also great at what she does! She gives very helpful tips and finds ways to make the class engaging for her students. 

These past few weeks we had the opportunity to work on presentations with our fellow classmates on the chapters of the iSpeak: Public Speaking for Contemporary Life book. We were each assigned into groups and given a few chapters to work on. I enjoyed working with my group to create a presentation where we each got to learn important skills to help us better our speech. I also enjoyed learning from the other groups and seeing their presentations. Everyone who participated in this did a fantastic job. Each group created memorable PowerPoints and they all delivered their information excellently. I am looking forward to working on future projects with my group and learning more about Public Speaking.

Starting off with my group (group 1), I am very proud of the presentation we gave! I was very fortunate to have been paired with a group of intelligent, hard working and friendly individuals. Although we were all a bit nervous to be the first ones to present, I think we pulled it off. 

Our group had to present chapters 1-3. Here we gave tips on preparing a presentation. We also gave some tips on how to speak and present effectively. We explained why public speaking is so important and what you can benefit from it. My group also shared  the best topics to present, what to avoid in presentations, and how to organize, prepare and style your speeches/presentations. Although I believe my group did a great job we did face a few complications during our presentation. One of my group members had a lot of background noise that he could not control which made it difficult to be able to hear him. Another one of my group members was experiencing trouble with his computer and had to exit the class and rejoin. We also ran out of time which resulted in us needing to cut our final questions short. Given our circumstances we still found a way to push through and try to give the best presentation possible. Sometimes things happen that are out of our control but we must find ways to work with what we got. I was very proud of myself and my group members for excelling, we also got good feedback from the class leaders and our professor! 

Next we have group 2, they presented chapters 4-6. They did a great job in my opinion, this group also faced a few challenges but still managed to give the class an awesome presentation. This group shared some tips on how to excel in an interview. I thought this was a very important topic to talk about because we will all experience being interviewed at least once in our life; whether that be for a job, school, etc. They also explained the best way to prepare for a presentation. Overall, group 2 did amazing, they had a few members who did not show up to the presentations and found a way to work around that. They also shared helpful tips and kept their audience very engaged. 

After came group 3, who presented chapters 7-9. This group was one of my favorites! Their PowerPoint was very organized and easy to follow. They shared many tips regarding the use of your body when giving a presentation. When presenting it is really important to be as natural as possible. This means to avoid fidgeting and moving around for no reason.  They also shared the different modes of delivery, how to use your voice and specific type of language effectively and lastly the types of visual resources you can use to make your presentation more engaging to your audience. When presenting it is important to use sensory aids. This helps capture your audience's attention and makes what you are presenting more memorable. Some examples of visual aids are graphs, pictures, videos and even handouts. I believe they did a great job and I am looking forward to seeing more of their work in future projects. 

Lastly we have group 4, they went over chapters 9-12 and the appendix. This group discussed why it is important to know why you are presenting. When we create presentations there is always an objective. Why are we presenting? To whom are we presenting for? No matter what it is we are talking about, the point of our presentation is to inform our audience about a specific topic. They also shared the different kinds of speeches there are and the different occasions in which people present speeches. This group did a fantastic job at explaining their information and sharing important details that will be useful in this class and in future presentations. I am looking forward to seeing them share more interesting information to the class in our next group project. 

Overall, I believe that every group excelled in their presentations. They each had beautiful PowerPoints that were easy to read and follow. They also shared really important information that will help all of us in future speeches. I am very excited to continue further my learning in this class and continue to work and create with my classmates.