How to prepare for a speech?
Hey guys, so, I'm going to be doing a speech in about three days on sustainability for my school's speech competition and I'm extremely nervous! This will be the biggest audience I've ever had to talk in front of(bigger than the audience during my Drama performances) and I'm really nervous - about mucking up, about people finding my speech boring etc. I just wanted to ask if anyone had any tips to prepare my speech? What should I do before it? What kind of things do you think might capture the audience's attention?(I've tried to mention mainstream things like Harambe in terms of how so many people are angry over this death but don't bat an eye to the hundreds of other gorillas dying or the billions of animals that are and I've also talked about how the destruction of flora and fauna will personally affect us).
Comments
Well first, repeat it at your home without any paper. It will give you some confidence and you will remember the pattern. Do it until you're able to make the speech without using idiotly the same words everytime. Recording yourself can help you to know what's wrong and you should check the length at every try.
Then you can try to read it to someone's else (your family for example) to see how you do it in front of a public.
Before D-Day, if you're allowed to take a paper, write the important ideas. Only them and the statistics, if you don't remember them. You've got to choose the right words so you remember quickly the idea even if stressed.
Also it's important but.. do not think about failing. Think rationnally about why you think you will fail and you will know that the only barrier to succeed is you. It's just a test after all.
Been down this road many times fam.
Practice practice practice. Start with a fairly in-depth outline and reduce your dependency on the notes as you become more comfortable with speaking.
Preferably give the speech to family members. Try not to get flustered after a mistake, just move on.
Make sure you're using appropriate gestures and have good posture,
Basically, the best cure for nerves is mastering the speech ahead of time. It's a serious time commitment, but takes your speaking to the next level.
Read a bit of this.
TED Talks are great.
As others said, practice! That's the most important thing. When the time comes, it will help you get your speech started, and once it's started, your nervousness will go away. Practice also helps you gauge how long your speech is going to take, so it's not too quick, but it also doesn't go on and on.
What techniques you use depends on the speech. Are you being deadpan serious? Humorous? Talking about something serious but using a little humor to draw the audience in? All of these are valid depending on the subject matter.
Many people are absolutely sick of hearing about Harambe by now, because of the abuse in YouTube comments. If you mention him, you might acknowledge that. "I know some of you have been hearing a lot about Harambe lately, way more than you want to, but bear with me, because this is important!"
Do your best to convince the audience that what you're talking about should matter to them. You should be more important than what their minds would otherwise wander off to.
If the audience is allowed to heckle you or ask questions, be prepared for that. If someone asks a question that you don't know the answer to, admit that (and say it's a very good question), and suggest a way how that person could find the answer.
Good luck!
Try not to have a panic attack.
1mg xanax with a glass of beer 30 minutes before speech. always helps me.
Ya don't. I just took zero's in school and didn't do them.
[has two panic attacks]
Yeah, tell them about Harambe. Lie he was your school friend and now you're heartbroken. This will capture audience's attention for sure.
Sorry but was this sarcasm? I can't tell x.x
That's it, prink! Sarcasm. Don't be too serious and they will like you. Good luck.
Die of fear.
I've pretty much done this I think xD
One of my College grades was to do a presentation. Failed obviously. Get a sudden stutter when people are looking at me. Fear of doing it wrong and that fear turns into me actually doing it wrong because my brain cant do the word things.
Several people have convinced me to imagine the audience as potatoes as to minimize my fear and nervousness xD
Well it'll work for most... but not for Sasha
That is a scary and hilarious image thinking of Adolf Hitler doing that.
Fake your own death.
Oh, btw guys, I succeeded! I managed to do my speech in front of everyone xD and people I never interacted with before have been telling me that they liked it