Thread: On Making Public Speeches

Can anybody check my essay? I've written it just for myself, without any task. Just got an idea and expressed it. I want to share it with my English Club mates, but also will be pleased to share it with you guys.

I would appreciate your opinions on any aspect of writing: grammar, structure, style, the idea in general.

(see the corrected text below)

That's just too long .

Some repeated mistakes I have noticed:

"to speak on public"—should be "in (or before) public"

"have challenges (at) doing something" — you should either say "have problems/trouble doing something" or, if you like the word "challenge" so much, you can say something like "Some of us find speaking in public a challenging task"

Hello Dettaglio. You write very well in English. Here are my suggested corrections, alternatives or optional words, and relocated words. (I did not mean to change the layout and indenting of your text, nor to remove the bullet marks. I don't know how you copy those into a post.)

Making a Fluent Public Speech

Dmitri Lebedev (detail@ngs.ru), 09.12.2007 (12/9/07 AmE)
This idea came to me after making/having a discussion in/at the English Club together with Vitaliy Sinitsa, on December 9th, 2007.

Many of us have challenges when speaking in public and envy those who can come out without a paper and speak for a long time without stopping. How can you learn to do the same? My answer is simple: you need to have something that you NEED to tell to people.

There is no magic, no psychological treatment. If you have challenges with speaking in public, there is a 99% chance that you are an absolutely normal person. Do you feel well in the company of friends and family, in an informal situation and speak much/a lot and fluently? I think you do. Where does all this go when you speak in public/speak before a group?

Let’s remember/think about situations from everyday life. How do you speak when you meet a good friend for the first time in a month? You may talk quicker than usual and exchange an incredible amount of information! Definitely you speak freely and fluently.

Why don’t you speak freely in challenging situations? Let’s say one makes a report at a seminar in the university and speaks badly, looks at the paper/notes too much or just reads it, as many students do.

Why? I guess there are two reasons:




1. With your friend you have a lot of things to say, but when you make a half-baked report just to get credit for the course, you aren’t interested in the things you say, and you don’t remember them all/all of them.

2. You also have much more to tell your friend/many more things to tell your friend because you lower your “level”. You can tell even a vulgar joke (anecdote) to your friend, if you usually do, but you don’t tell it to a wider audience. That’s normal and rational.



Many boast to be able to speak profusely at an exam when they know almost nothing. Is it a good skill? I think, it is not necessary, not what you should work at, because in this case you need to invent something on the fly and to speak of what/on something you don’t know, sometimes saying absolutely wrong things. This can make you not have a good reputation. It's better if you are honest, direct and excellent at telling/saying/speaking about things you believe in.

So, when you speak fluently, you



- have something you want to tell/say (You may want to tell/say many things, but for a public speech you need a very clear idea of what you want to tell/say/speak about.)

- aren’t afraid of making a mistake



How do you learn these two things together?

The following method worked for me. First you need to start making very well prepared public speeches.



1. Write your speech; maybe even write it down entirely/write every word of it down! That will take more time, but you’ll not have to invent anything on the fly (many of us, including me, can’t do that).

2. Read this speech to a person whom you trust (and who can comprehend the subject) and ask for critics. At first it is not a problem if you just read it from paper/your notes.

3. Make corrections, add new ideas that come to you (they will come!), and cut out everything that is unnecessary/not needed.

4. Read it to another person.



Read the speech first for 3-5 times to different persons. This way you will rework the speech in your mind, you will find problems and add important things that you forgot to mention when you wrote the first draft. Also you’ll store all your ideas in the “near” memory/in your short-term memory, ( http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_18617 ... emory.html ) and better comprehend the subject of your speech. You will make the ideas YOURS.

While reading to the 3rd, maybe the 4th person you'll find that you’ll not need to read; you’ll have already memorized everything. But memorizing here is not a goal, never try to just learn by heart! Memorizing is just a good side-effect. Always keep to the main points of the speech.

And, voila, for your public speech




- You have enough things to tell/say/speak about

- You'll have memorized all the necessary details (of course, you will forget something, but very few, that nobody/anybody will notice)

- You aren’t afraid to say something wrong, because you’ve tested it

- You aren’t afraid to seem incompetent, because you’ve comprehended enough of/about the subject of your speech by reworking it



Isn’t it good to speak and feel confident in/about every word that you say?

Some psychologists suggest learning/that you learn to feel free, to abstract from thinking of/about responsibility, to practice in a psycho-correction group/in a group therapy session, and other things. I’m not a psychologist, and I preach a direct approach. [1] Indeed, I read stories of teachers who were good at their subject, but felt constrained when they read lectures (being afraid of not conforming to their own image of ideal lector/lecturer). There are cases of psychosomatic disorders in which psychological correction/therapy may help. But I think if you learn to feel free inside, and then go out there and try to speak on subjects that you don’t like, you may have the same difficulties again.
Instead, if the subject is incredibly interesting for you, you don’t pay much attention to the process of telling/speaking about it; it is just a means of communication, you feel excitement from letting others know your idea.

My own success story

In the 8th semester I had to make two speeches: one at a students’ conference, on my diploma project, and later another at the presentation of the/my thesis. Before that, my speeches were not quite/very good; I felt nervous, and hesitated. But for the conference I prepared the speech in the way I have suggested above. The result was stunning: the speech at the conference was very good, and the presentation of the thesis was splendid: very persuasive, very rich with information that was easy to perceive and I seemed to know everything well. I got the highest rate/mark for a speech at the conference. My classmate, who was there, never had seen me speak so well and said I seemed like I was drugged/I was high on speed/crack. Instead, the only thing I did was make good preparation and a good diploma project/was prepare well and do a good diploma project.

That wasn’t a miracle, and after that my life didn’t become perfect. I did/gave both good and bad speeches. But what made them good or bad wasn’t my psychological state of mind nor any magical influence. It was just the/thorough preparation: my knowledge, willingness to communicate information and my own comprehension of their subjects.

After you are good at prepared speeches you may start learning to make/have the same good performance with less preparation and less things printed on paper/and fewer notes. This is what I learned in/at English Club, where often I was the spokesperson. Sometimes we forgot to write something down, and I had to prepare things on the fly. In such a situation the only condition you need is to have something that you NEED to tell/say/speak about.

If you take someone else’s text and try to retell those ideas, and probably you aren’t interested in the subject, or studied it not too deeply, you won’t have many distinct ideas to tell/speak about, the ideas won’t be yours, and it's no wonder that you won’t speak fluently and profusely. You will speak slowly, feel ill at ease, and won’t have/make much eye contact. Don’t internalize it, it means nothing about you as a person or as a spokesperson. Being shy in such a situation is OK for a normal man: your “inner brakes” stop you from telling/saying/speaking nonsense.

On the other hand, ( http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/on+ ... other+hand ) if you believe in something, maybe want to communicate an interesting idea that you share, want others to learn useful information, then words will come naturally and easy to you, you will look into the eyes of the listeners seeking for understanding/seeking their understanding, you will be vital, make gestures, and have good body language, etc.

I know I may look impressive at the English Club, but I also I have many things to learn. Here I said/have written only about feeling well at speeches and speaking fluently. Other dimensions to travel/study and learn about are: better communication (speaking fluently doesn’t yet guarantee that) and being fascinating so that speeches don’t tire people out and are a pleasure to listen to.

Psychologists’ recommendations may also work: by abstracting from the speech, role play trainings/training and other methods you may obtain inner freedom. But this is an indirect approach. You still have to prepare your speech, just because you need to care about the quality of what you say. I believe that most people can do well just by feeling the strong will to deliver the content, by having enough of it/enough content, by feeling confident in it, and by being excited about communicating/excited to communicate the ideas.

Thanks to Viktoria Lebedeva and Andrea Giunti for listening and proofreading, and to all 10 persons/ten people that I met at the English Club on December 9th, 2007.

Endnote: ( http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_/endnote.html )

[1] My fellow psychologist says: “The best psycho-correction group/group therapy is the one where no psychological correction is done”. ( http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_/grou ... erapy.html )

@translations.nm.ru: Ok. But I have heard native speakers say "have challenges with..." That's why it seems ok to me.

@Ken Watts: thanks a lot for the correction job. I guess, it took much time. I've made the corrections to my copy of the text.

Here is the corrected version in MS Word format
http://slil.ru/25213499[/url]

Hello again Dettaglio. I see you've also "reworked" and improved the paper. By the way your ideas about preparing and making a speech in public are 100% dead on (correct).

Here are some corrections that were missed:

Many of us have challenges when speaking in public . . . (Here one speaks in public or before the public. The word "on" can be used like so: speaking on public radio/television, speaking on a topic of importance.)

Why don’t you speak freely in challenging situations?
(Here you must relocate "you" as I've indicated in green. This is the proper construction for a question. If you want to leave it the way you have it then you must end the sentence with a period (so that it is not a question): Why you don’t speak freely in challenging situations.)

. . . and you don’t remember them all.
or:
. . . and you don't remember all of them.

This can make not a good reputation for you. (still sounds a bit awkward)
Maybe: This can give you a bad reputation.

. . . you will find problems and add important things that you forgot to mention when you wrote the first draft.

While reading to the 3rd, maybe the 4th person, you’ll find

. . . never try to just learn it by heart!
or:
. . . never try to learn it just by heart!

(of course, you will forget something, but very few, none that anybody will notice)
or:
(of course, you will forget something, but very few, and nobody will notice)

. . . it is just the means of communication . . .
or:
. . . it is just a means of communication . . .

I got the highest mark for a speech at the defense among the stream.
(I didn't understand what "stream" meant the first time. Now I see:

stream . . . 8. U.K. education group of pupils of similar ability: a group or level in which students of similar ability are placed and taught together

Encarta(R) World English Dictionary [North American Edition] (2007) http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_/stream.html )
If you think this paper might also be read by Americans, then I suggest a compromise:
I got the highest mark for a speech at the defense among the stream, the group of students giving defenses.

In the paper you write: "I'm not a psychologist . . ." then in the endnote you write "My fellow psychologist . . . ". These appear to conflict with each other. So if you are not a psychologist then I suggest in the endnote you write "My friend, a psychologist, . . . "

Ken, thanks for corrections, I've added them to my text. Now it's published at my homepage http://ryba4.com/essays/public-speech