Daily Life in China                  

How to Deliver a Speech.

Speech preparation:                 

   1. Write for your target (靶) audience.  To whom are you speaking?  Target your speech for their level of understanding. 

   2. Select material (本事) that is 1) interesting, 2) meaningful to your audience, and 3) material your audience will understand. 

  3. Try to write about something you know or care about.  By writing from your own experience you generally write better.  Since it’s something you care about or are interested in it is usually easier to write about and will be easier to remember. 

   Don’t take long quotes from other authors; depend on your self.  Interpret (譯)or get suggestions from other authors but have the main thinking yours.  Your speech will be 10 times better if it is from you than from taking quotes from someone else.

   4. Your speech should have a beginning, middle and an end just as you would find in a written story.  You first introduce your topic, and then start your beginning section.  Follow that by discussing the topics you want to develop (middle), including details for each point you mention. Finally, you need a strong conclusion (ending).

Topic (話題) Selection:

   Choose a topic the audience can relate to or cares about.  If the topic is chosen for you then try to relate the topic to your audience or develop parts of your topic to their concerns. 

   The idea is to bring the audience along with you by making them understand your view of your topic (introduction and beginning).  Make them understand your point of view on the topic and why it’s important for them, (the middle).  And finally, complete and wrap up for them in your summary the main point or at most two you want them to understand from your speech, (the end).

   To make the speech clear to yourself, write it in outline form listing briefly the points for each section.  It will help you to better understand the keywords and where to put your inflection stress and pauses.

Writing your speech:

   Writing for a speech is different than writing you would do for a formal paper like a report.  The written speech reflects what you will give as a speech so usages and sentence construction is different than a formal paper.  If you break a rule or have something that is odd for a written paper it’s ok for a speech paper. 

    Eliminate (排斥) any word, phrase or sentence that is not directly relevant (相應) to the development of the theme of your talk.  Any interesting but unrelated items should be eliminated.  Everything in your speech must be pertinent.  The test is; if you can eliminate any word, phrase or sentence without loosing meaning or detracting from the development of your theme then get rid of it.  Don’t drift or wander about in your speech, make every word count and be meaningful. 

    You want your speech to be clear and easy to follow in its development.  Develop only your theme from beginning, middle to end.

Introduction:

    Introduce your topic to the audience, the title and topic briefly or just the title.

Beginning: 

   In the beginning you give the audience an idea of what you will say.  You give them the big picture of what the topic is and what you say about it.  You give to them an understanding of what you will present.  You are setting the stage for your topic.

Middle: 

   The middle section should develop your topic point by point in a progressive clear way.  You fill in the detail about the topic you introduced.  You have your main arguments or points you want to say here which support your topic.

End:    

   The end of your speech should be a summary of the middle section.  It should be statements that seem to come as a result of the things you said in the middle.  It should be powerful and if possible some statement included which will be easy to understand and remember.

Your Speech:

Voice:

    There are many types of voices used when you speak.  Your speaking to a classmate in the hall is different than the speaking you do when you stand up to answer a teacher’s question.  Your voice level and inflections are different.

    The voice levels, tones and pauses in a speech contest are also different and should match the occasion: a speech contest voice.  It is different than your usual voice and may seem out of character for you.  It should seem different because a speech contest requires a different voice. 

    Your tone levels should be more noticeable than your usual speech.  Your speech should be more deliberate and pauses greater between words and sentences for more impact.  You are saying many things in a short period in a speech and not taking part in a one to one conversation.   You are one to one with a silent audience and giving a lot of material to them so you want it clear and understandable. 

    To help that happen you should use a bigger voice, a slow deliberate delivery, more intonation and more pauses than your usual voice.  If you usually have a small voice this type of speaking will seem unusual or awkward for you but when you speak it will seem normal to an audience.  It is expected that your voice will be larger and stronger.

     The opening sentences are crucial and will establish whether you will get the attention of your audience.  They should be strong, pointed and deliberate and give the audience a clear idea of your topic, (the introduction an beginning).

    The mid section, (middle) of the speech should stress the few points your want to deliver about your topic.  Your increased inflection and pauses help to stress those points so the audience understands exactly what you want them to understand clearly. 

    Your final section, (end) should be powerful and deliberate with stress on the keywords in your summary. 

Delivery:

1. Approach the podium confidently and put your notes in a place where you can see them easily.            

2. Stand up straight with your feet shoulder-width apart. Look at the audience, pause and begin speaking. If there is no microphone, project from your diaphragm, not your throat.      

3. Set the tone in your introduction with appropriate facial expressions and diction, and a specific mood (such as folksy or hard-hitting).            

4. Make eye contact with people in different parts of the audience, including the back row.        

5. Pause briefly after you state key points to allow the audience time to absorb the information. Also, use natural and relaxed hand gestures and facial expressions to emphasize certain points.  

6. Pronounce your words clearly and vary your rate, pitch and volume to keep the delivery lively.  

7. Close your speech by thanking the audience and then confidently exiting the stage.

David