Speech

A Brief Guide to Successful
Public Speaking
You can use this guide to prepare for your fi rst speech and as a checklist for all the speeches you give in your public speaking class. You can also use the guide as a handy reference for speeches you give aft er college.
Presenting a speech involves six basic stages:
1. Determining your purpose and topic (Chapter 4)
2. Adapting to your audience (Chapter 5)
3. Researching your topic (Chapter 6)
4. Organizing your ideas (Chapter 8)
5. Practicing your speech (Chapter 12)
6. Presenting your speech (Chapter 12)
Th ese stages blend together—they’re integrated parts of a whole, not discrete units. For example,
■ As you’re analyzing your audience (stage 2), you revise your topic focus (stage 1).
■ What you fi nd out about your audience (stage 2) will infl uence how you research your topic (stage 3).
■ When practicing your speech (stage 5), you may decide that the fl ow of your ideas won’t work for your audience (stage 2), so you go back and modify the organization of your ideas
(stage 4).
Although public speaking may seem to be all about presenting, most of a successful speaker’s work takes place behind the scenes, well before the speaking event. Let’s go through each activity in the speechmaking process.
1. Determine Your Purpose and Topic
a. Decide on your overall goal, or the general purpose of your speech.
• First speeches in a public speaking class usually aim to inform or enhance listeners’ knowledge of a topic. Example: In introducing a classmate, you’d want your audience to learn a few key bits of information about the person.
• Some fi rst speeches seek to entertain listeners by sharing anecdotes and using humor. Example:
In introducing yourself, you might tell your audience a funny story about your summer vacation. • Speeches to persuade focus on infl uencing people’s behaviors, values, or attitudes. Example: Trying to convince audience members to exercise regularly involves persuasion.
b. After you’ve identified the speech’s general purpose, choose your topic.
• Sometimes your instructor will assign a topic for your fi rst speech, such as introducing yourself to the class.
• In other cases, your assignment may be more broad, like informing the audience about an important campus issue.
• Pick something of interest to you that you think will appeal to your audience too.
2. Adapt to Your Audience
a. In choosing a topic, keep your audience in mind so your speech will interest them.
• In-depth research allows you to design a speech tailored to your audience.
• You probably won’t be able to do in-depth research for your fi rst speech, but just looking around the classroom gives you some clues about your audience. Demographic characteristics such as ethnic background, age, sex, and educational level tell you a lot. Example: If you wanted to give a speech about aff ordable housing in your community, you’d probably want to approach the issue from the point of view of renters, not landlords, because your student audience is far more likely to rent than to own their own home.
b. Adapting your speech to your audience means that you apply the information you’ve gathered about them when designing your speech.
• Target your message to this particular audience at this particular time and place.
• Use audience-centered communication that engages your listeners and helps you achieve your goal for the speech.
• You want your audience to feel as if you’re speaking directly to them.
3. Research Your Topic
a. You have many sources of information for your speech topics.
• Common sources are books, websites, magazines, newspapers, government publications, and interviews with individuals.
• But begin with yourself and what you already know about the topic.
b. Once you’ve identified your knowledge base, seek out additional sources of information