Checklist for Your First Speech

Suggestions for Finding a Topic

• Make a personal inventory. What hobbies, interests, jobs, or experiences have you had that would be interesting to others?

• Talk to friends. Perhaps they have ideas to share with you, including topics they would like to know more about.

• Read. Newspapers, newsmagazines, and books are filled with ideas. You should commit to reading at least one newspaper a day and one newsmagazine a week while enrolled in this course.

• Check the Internet. There are so many subject areas discussed on the Internet, along with interest-based chat groups, if you enjoy "surfing the net," you may well find speech ideas there for the taking.

• Brainstorm. Brainstorming is a creative process used for generating a large number of ideas. A group of people get together and put forth many varied ideas. One person writes them down. No one is allowed to evaluate the ideas until the group has listed every last one it can think of. Then one or more members go back and critically examine the ideas. When brainstorming, work from the broad topic down to narrower topics. "Wearing seat belts" might seem like an overdone topic. But a speech on how even drivers of cars with air bags aren't fully protected if they don't wear seat belts might be a new slant on an old topic. Use the situation, audience, and your own goals as criteria for judging the possible topics.

Six Criteria for an Appropriate Speech Topic

1. The topic should be interesting to you. If you don't care about the topic, how can you expect your audience to care?

2. It should be interesting to your audience or at least be capable of being made interesting to them. This is why it is crucial to know as much as possible about your audience.

3. It should be appropriate to the situation. If your instructor has asked you to speak on your pet peeve, she or he probably is thinking of topics like "dorm food," "roommates," or "people who blow smoke in my face," not the destruction of the rain forests.

4. It should be appropriate to the time available. One limitation of a public speaking class is time. Know what your instructor expects and stick to it. Further, consider the time you have available to prepare. If the speech is due next week, you won't be able to send off for information from your state senator. Pick a topic that you can research in the time available.

5. It should be manageable. Don't pick something beyond your abilities or resources. One of your greatest assets in speaking is your own credibility, which is the degree to which your audience trusts and believes in you. Nothing will undermine it faster than speaking on a topic with which you are unfamiliar. Know more than your audience. Why else would you speak to them?

6. It should be worthwhile. We treat time in our society as a commodity. We bank time, spend time, and buy time. You are angered if someone wastes your time. Don't waste your audience's time. Pick a topic that will inform, persuade, or entertain by presenting them with ideas or information they haven't already heard. Just as we hate to hear an old joke told over again, we don't like to hear for the umpteenth time that we ought to re-cycle our aluminum cans, unless the speaker tells us something new and insightful about why we should do just that. If you pick a well-worn topic, then you must give it a different "spin" or focus.

Developing Resources for Inventing Your Speech

1. Begin with your own experiences. Each of us has had experiences that make us unique. Many early speech assignments require you to look no further than to the things that have happened in your own life. For example, you may be asked to introduce yourself or tell a story about a personally significant experience. You may be able to rely on hobbies or past job experiences for an early informative speech. Even if you cannot rely solely on personal experience, it is the logical place to begin searching for information.

Speaking about matters with which you have firsthand experience personally connects you to your message. What's more, this personal connection may also tell you how to connect your message to the personal and professional needs of your audience. For example, a successful actress, who was enrolled in one of the author's classes at the University of Southern California, gave a speech on how to break into "show biz." Unfortunately, she failed to mention her own experience, which included a role in a Clint Eastwood movie and a recurring role on the sitcom "The Odd Couple." Had she done so, her speech would have connected more effectively to the audience, in effect saying, "If I can do this, so can you!"

Even though your personal experience and knowledge is a good source with which to start, don't stop there. No matter how intense your experience or extensive your knowledge, there always is more to learn. In the effort to augment personal experience and knowledge, then, consult other sources as well.

2. Look to general sources of information. Books, reference books, general-circulation periodicals (Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, etc.), and even public affairs programs, such as 60 Minutes, Dateline, or 20/20, are good places to look for information on topics of general interest. Keep in mind that books may have a long lead time before they are published. Thus, on topics that require up-to-date information, you need to rely on more recent sources, such as periodicals, rather than books. A speech on why the United States got involved in the Vietnam War, for example, might well rely on books and encyclopedias, whereas a speech on the current Bosnian situation would require the most recent sources available.

3. Interview experts. Sometimes you can interview an expert on the topic of your speech. You may not have to look any further than the other classes you are taking. An interview with an environmental-science instructor, for example, could provide a wealth of information for a unique speech about recycling. Further, experts often provide leads to other sources of information the speaker can read. Be sure to prepare thoroughly for your interview so that you know what questions to ask. Chapter 7 contains specific guidelines for conducting interviews, which you should consult before interviewing sources for any speech.

4. Conduct computerized searches, including the Internet. At one time the beginning public speaker relied primarily on paper indexes, such as the Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature . In some libraries, these may still be the best means of access. However, more and more libraries are providing computerized data-bases, such as The Expanded Academic Index. In addition, many students now have access to the Internet either through their universities or through private Internet Service Providers (ISP). While one must be cautious about the reliability of many web sites on the Internet, there is a wealth of information available to the average citizen. For example, according to one poll, some 20 million Americans read at least portions of the Starr Report on the Internet.1 Whatever you might think of his claims about the president's conduct in office, never before in history have average citizens been able to read unedited government reports with such ease. However, the assumption that just because something is on the Internet, it must be true, is clearly false, as was evidenced by a bogus claim made that TWA flight 800 had been shot down by a missile, which was widely circulated on the Internet, despite having been disproved by the FBI.

Your school may also have access to Lexis/Nexis, a service that allows for searches of newspapers, magazines, wire service reports, court transcripts, law digests, and even television program transcripts. If you have access to such resources, they will provide a systematic way to find articles on your topic. Further, they will save you time and improve the quality of your research.

5. Consider specialized sources of information. Every discipline has specialized journals and books, as well as indexes to provide access to them. Chapter 7 discusses some of the more commonly used indexes. If you are dealing with a specialized topic early in the class, you probably should skip ahead to that chapter or meet with a reference librarian to help familiarize yourself with the resources available at your school. You might also consider other types of specialized sources, such as trade publications and government publications, if they are appropriate to your topic. For your early speeches, such specialization probably will not be necessary, but you should be aware that there is more to researching a speech than simply consulting the general books and periodicals found in most libraries.

As you gather information, whether from written sources or interviews, be sure to carefully record the facts and quotations you discover. Note not only what was said but also who said it, when, and where. As we discuss in Chapter 7, documenting your evidence for an audience will build your credibility, which will enhance the likelihood you will be effective in delivering your speech.

Seven Steps for Organizing Your Speech

1. Open with impact. In this step you capture your audience's attention.

2. Focus on your thesis statement. In this step you draw the audience's attention to the central point of your speech.

3. Connect with your audience. In this step you let the audience know "what's in it for them."

4. Preview the body of your speech.. This is where you tell your what you are going to tell them in the body of the speech.

5. Present your main points. In this step you present the body of your speech. This will constitute the bulk of your presentation.

6. Summarize your main points. In this step you tell the audience what you've told them.

7. Close with impact. In this step you leave your audience with a lasting impression.

Ways to Close Your Speech Effectively

• Present a short, memorable quotation. This is often an effective way to reinforce your specific purpose and wrap up your presentation.

• Use an anecdote or a story that illustrates your point. However, it must leave a lasting impression on your audience. A long, drawn out, pointless story will cause your audience to lose interest.

• Make a direct appeal or "call to action." Just as a successful evangelist asks the faithful to come forward at the end of a crusade, effective persuasive speakers seek a public commitment from their audience to act on their messages. If you are opposed to a tuition hike, appeal to the audience to contact the board of trustees or sign a petition supporting your position. Perhaps the most famous direct appeal to action was in President John F. Kennedy's inaugural, where he challenged his fellow Americans to "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."3

• Return to your opening. This is one of the best ways to end a speech because it brings the listeners full circle. Suppose you began your plea for people to sign organ donor cards with the story of a little girl who needed a liver transplant. At the end of the speech you can describe how her life was saved because a donor was found. This gives the speech a sense of wholeness and completeness.

Tips for Making an Impromptu Presentation

• Think about what basic point you want to make about the topic. If you are asked about lowering the drinking age to 18, are you for or against it? If you don't know what your stand is, you might list the pros and cons of the issue and suggest that the audience needs to reach its own conclusion. If you are not informed on the topic, try linking it to something on which you do have information. Note that most instructors give students a choice from among two or three topics for impromptu speaking exercises. It is not their purpose to embarrass or "stump" the speaker.

• Think of one or more points that support your position. If you want to lower the drinking age to 18, is it because that's the age at which people can vote, sign contracts, and enlist in the armed forces?

• If you have time, think of an attention-getter as an introduction. If you knew of a specific case of an 18-20 year old who had served in the military and risked his or her life you might use that as a "hook" to begin your speech.

• State your topic in the introduction---it buys you time and then you are sure the audience knows what you are saying. "I'm in favor of lowering the drinking age to 18, and I have three basic reasons."

• As a conclusion, summarize what you've said. "So, because 18 is the age at which people can vote, sign contracts, and enlist in the armed forces, I believe it's only fair to extend all adult rights to 18-year-olds."

If you do not have time to organize your thoughts, at least take a moment to think of your focus and two or three main points. Believe it or not, in a few seconds you can organize a fairly decent impromptu speech. We engage in spontaneous conversations all the time. Thinking and speaking are not mutually exclusive.

• Develop an optimistic attitude toward speaking.
• Don’t procrastinate preparing your speech.
• Look for opportunities to gain speaking experience.
• Set realistic goals.
• Realize the audience wants you to succeed.
• Practice constructive self-talk.
• Direct your concerns at important issues.

1. Find a place where you will not be disturbed.
2. Set up the area as similar to the actual speech situation as possible. If you will be using a lectern, for example, use some object (like a chair or stool) to represent the lectern.
3. Practice alone first, only later in front of friends. Or tape-record your practice for later review.
4. Run through the whole speech at least once to see what areas need work.
5. Practice particular sections of the speech that are giving you trouble. Get these down "pat".
6. Go back and run through the entire speech again.
7. To work on nonverbal aspects of delivery, use a mirror or videotape yourself, if possible. At a minimum, try to tape-record your speech.
8. Finally, be sure to try a run-through with an "audience" of friends, roommates, or classmates.

1. Immediately begin to analyze your goals. Ask yourself if they are realistic given your experience and commitment to this class.
2. Begin today to assess the degree to which you routinely engage in negative self-talk. Write down the self-criticizing, self-pressuring, and catastrophizing statements you routinely make to yourself. Describe in writing how these statements affect your level of arousal and anxiety before, during, and following your speeches.
3. Make a list of the positive coping statements you could substitute for the negative ones you now make. Begin to use these statements as you prepare and practice your speech.
4. Once you’re confident that you have thoroughly prepared your speech, find a quiet time in which you can both practice relaxation imagery and visually rehearse your speech. Do this for 15 minutes every other day, actually practicing your speech in between.
5. Use your positive coping statements as you are about to speck, while speaking, and after speaking.

• Describe to yourself what you did well.
• List areas in which you still hope to improve. Write down at least three realistic goals for your next presentation.
• Engage in positive self-talk, such as "It wasn’t as bad as I thought," "I did okay," "People smiled at me and gave me positive feedback.
• Breathe deeply; practice muscular relaxation.

• Limit the number of main points.
• Focus each main point on one main point.
• Construct main points so that they are parallel in structure.
• State main points as simply as the subject will allow.
• Give all main points equal treatment.

• Refer to preceding and upcoming ideas. For example, "Now that you know what computer viruses are, I’ll discuss how to prevent their spread to your computer."
• Enumerate key points. If you number your points in the preview, stick with that numbering plan in the signposts. For example: "First, never assume that a program from a friend or computer bulletin board is virus free."
• Give nonverbal reinforcement. Frequently, you can emphasize you verbal signposts nonverbally. Changes in vocal inflection signal a change is coming. Movement can signal a signpost. For example, some speakers physically move from one place to another while speaking in order to emphasize that they are moving from one point to the next. Others hold up fingers to indicate number of points.
• Use visual aids to reinforce signposts. Moving to a new page on your flip chart or putting up a new slide or transparency clearly signals to your audience that you are moving on. It’s also a way to help you remember the sequence of your speech.
• Use words that cue your audience that you are changing points. Words and phrases like the following suggest a signpost: next, another, number, moving on, finally, therefore, in summary. Don’t be afraid to be explicit about signposts. More speeches suffer from a lack of clear signposts than from being overly signposted.

• Use bright colors and large, bold lettering. This will make your notes easier to see.
• Use no more than five or six lines per note card. If you cram too much on one card, you’ll end up confusing yourself.
• Put each part of a speech on a separate card. For example, your introduction might go on one card, the body on another, and the conclusion on a third. That way you won’t have trouble finding your main points after you complete your introduction nor will you confuse your conclusion with a main point.
• Number your cards. It is easy to lose track of your place while speaking. One way to help prevent this from happening is to number each card. That way, even if you inadvertently get your cards out of order, you can quickly recover.
• Write on only one side of a card. If you try to write on both sides, you compound the chances of losing your place.
• Highlight main ideas. Just as you highlight key passages in books, highlight the points you wish to emphasize.
• Use note cards to make comments to yourself. It is perfectly appropriate, for example, to write prompts to yourself on your notes. For example, you might write "O.H." to remind yourself to show an overhead at that point in your speech.

Don’t try and write out your speech word for word. This will only encourage you to read your speech, rather than present it in a conversational manner. The only exception to this rule would be exact quotations, facts, or statistics, which obviously you need to write out. It is best to keep lengthy quotations to a minimum in speeches, however, as they inevitably lead to loss of eye contact with your audience.

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