Linking claims to evidence.

In your speech you will be using different arguements types in order to prove a solid an specific claim or thesis. In the different speeches presented in chapter 15, each of the speakers weigh on the pros and cons of institutionalized schooling and home schooling. In one of the videos, a girl named Dixie uses claims and reasoning made by other sources including some quotes from these authors to support her thesis that home school is better than regular. In contrast, Robert uses his personal experiences and valued sources to support his claim that home schooling is actually a burden on parents and actually less effective than school institution. He uses the reasoning of current issues and articles to prove that the quality of information cannot be matched by what the typical parent can give to children. Overall, both speakers use sound reasoning to support the main points that each person has set out. They both use a mix of inductive and deductive reasoning to support their thesis's. I would actually believe both of their arguments if they were presenting in front of me. They connected with their audience simply on a logos and ethos level. Their speeches are a prime example of what should be put forth in our final essay.

Discussing Reasoning

So, during a speech or actually any presentation that has to do with the English language, the audience will have to decipher the different types of arguments such as deductive, inductive, causal, and analogical. So, arguements have a basic format. They all have premises with sets the stage for a conclusion. A deductive argument uses logic to unlock arguments. It is often straightforward and doesn't need a lot of support to be valid. A inductive argument is based on personal experiences... it's an argument that cannot be completely fact. It can only use supported evidence in order to make the argument stronger or weaker. Then there is causal which uses events that trigger other events in order to get to a conclusion. Finally, there is analogical which compares and contrasts two scenario and draws similarities in each of them.

Persuading someone about my point of view...

So, I have recently tried to persuade my best friend that it is easier to get a movie recommendation from a stranger by calling someone at their workplace rather than calling a household number. I used a bunch in inductive arguments which tried to support the claim by making it stronger and more probable. So some of the premises that I used were that since night time was getting earlier and earlier, we had fewer chances to call unknown people. I say that more people are inclined to responding to a request from a unfamiliar person if there is sun out and the world is visible rather than at night where it is dark and anything can happen. I also added that when you call some person at a place where people work, he or she is more inclined to answer any question because most workers that answer the phone almost always ask, "how can I help you?". So, for the most part I was able to convince him that it is probably more likely that a person working will give an honest and sincere answer rather than someone in their private space.

Progress on My final speech....

So, My speech topic is on why social skills and effective communication skills should be taught or offered in every school. So, far I've had the chance to brainstorm a lot of intriguing ideas on the subject of social skills and communication. Just think about it, so many people in this world are oblivious in knowing how to convey the messages that they want to convey to the world. A lot of people remain ignorant to signals and cues given off by different humans. This really hurts their chances for replication and survival on this earth. This is the fundamental biological purpose of why we exist, to survive and replicate. Anything that can help us as humans to gather information in order to accomplish this should be taken advantage of. By social skills, I mean the ability to sense social patterns within certain age groups, cultures, and ethicities. I mean the savvy to know what is appropriate and not appropriate when interacting with other human beings. I mean enhancing and improving our communication threads and patterns in order to give off the vibe and message that we want others to know. Without knowing the possibilities and limits of human interactions, then right away those people are at a disadvantage. I'm doing my best to research various books and other sources to help prove my points.

The negative audiences... and persuasive strategies

When giving a persuasive speech, the majority of your target audience may have different views that might affect the effect the effectiveness of some of the strategies that you may have in place. For example, if your audience has a somewhat negative view of the topic that you chose, then you may have to establish your foundation or backbone that you can fall back on. Developing a strong relationship with your audience right away and relating to the majority's experiences and feelings are just some of the strategies that you can implement into your speech to make sure that you can increase the probability that your audience will listen. Also, try to convey your topic in a positive light as much as possible to shadow any negative thoughts that may come up. Another strategy is to anticipate any negative reactions to the argument and be prepared to back up research and your arguments. It may be difficult to persuade, but at least you can give a strong and well prepared fight.

The sea of persuasion and apple

The sea of persuasion I think is a great title to sum up our experiences here in the United States. Consumerism is a massive concept in our society. Businesses underlying principles is persuasion to the customers. A nice example of being immersed in the sea of persuasion would have to be within the apple computer company. Over a period of 20-30 years it has emerged as one of the most powerful industries on this Earth. People are constantly making the case that the consumer needs more. They should get the new iPhone because it has more memory, better features, and can even tell you your future fortune. Whether it is a new Phone, iPod, or MacBook, Apple always sells its product piece by piece, milking the life and possibilities for each one of its products. Somehow, they come up with new innovative ways to make a product better, and somehow many people want that one instead of being satisfied with their older version which is basically the same as the new one except for a couple of adjustments. I give Apple its props because of great products and great business. This is one example how I got swayed in the direction of Apple products. They just persuade people better than really any company I've seen in the past couple of decades.

Presentation outlines

So, in chapter twelve, there was a section that focused solely on the designing and use of presentation outlines. For the purposes of speech, the book presents three specific ways to outline. The first is call the working outline. The working outline serves as a skeleton for the speech. It includes a thesis, the main points and possible subpoints. The Complete Sentence outline organizes all of the thoughts into complete structured language that contains most of the bulk of information included in the speech. The last type as discussed in this chapter is the presentation outline which is basically a watered down version of the complete sentence outline. It takes key words and points from the complete sentence outline and uses them as memory cues for more information to pop out. The presentation outline is often transposed onto note cards and used in practicing and presenting the final product. For many people, presentation outlines can be a useful tool in making sure that their speeches have fluidity and conciseness.

Speech buddies ch.10 and 12

10.1 There are several ways to center and focus on your audience so that people will listen more to the speech. We should use inclusive language so that no one will feel left out. Also including the audience in some scenarios and using humor are two other good ways of including people.

10.2 Choose your words wisely, Make sure that that you are concise in your language and not ambiguious

12.1 Volume, pitch, rate, variety, articulation, and pronunciation are five important areas in delivery. What i want to focus on in the next speech is particularly my rate because it was way too fast last speech. By controling these factors, you can effectively give a speech.

12.2 Body language is key to conveying a message. You want to focus on five specific areas, eye contact, facial expressions, gestures, body movement, and appearance. In particular, i feel that i could work on my calming down the gestures that i did in my past 2 speeches. It was kind of distracting to the audience.

12.3 Practicing you speech is one of the most important parts of preping for an upcoming presentation. One tip that they mentioned was practicing in front of a small audience. I feel that because most people get frightened by giving a speech in front of an audience why not gradually desensitize the fear and practice in front of a small group of people.

Sexist language?

So, I read the flickr post on sexist languange and there is a lot of insightful feedback from a lot of the users. Many people seems to say that it doesn't bother them, yet many people look towards the other extreme and even say how dehumanizing some of the tags can be. My response to all of the comments is that it's all about perception. If someone thinks that a particular tag is degrading and undignified then that's his or her problem. I mean if we take all these tags and take them away then you might as use generic language like human or object. This is not what language is designed for. Yes, people think that a lot of the language we use in this day and age is sexist or racist but what the most important thing here is how each individual interprets the language. Yes, there is a certain point where people should draw the line, but if someone is caring about a not so pleasant tag that someone else that they completely do not know put then that's when there is trouble. It's all in the mind.

Discuss part of the reading of chapter 11

I just want to talk about the overall use of presentation media. The way we as humans take in information is through our senses. By speaking, we are affecting one of our various innate senses. If we increase the number of quality stimulus that we expose at any one time, we could possibly increase the effectiveness of the message of our speech. So, presentation media is a great way to indulge the sense of sight for the audience. When using these types of visual aids such as power point, the speaker should keep in mind the main points as well as some attention getters to keep the audience engaged in the show. Each visual aid should have a solid purpose for it to exist; otherwise it would just divert attention from the main topics. Also, these visual aids should be comprised with a variety of stimuli, ranging from words, to pictures, and maybe real life physical examples. Effective presentation media is a critical part to keeping the attention of the audience as well as providing key credibility and support for the speaker and the topic.

Self-evaluation #2

My purpose of this speech was to inform my audience about Neuro-linguistic programming. I thought that using my visual aids along with my voice, I was able to convey to my audience the main ideas of this science. I gave a brief definition, a little bit of the history, and some of the basic principles and techniques. During the speech, I actually felt more confident than my first speech. I had a whole bunch of information that I had to cut down to a period of 5-6 minutes. That was a huge challenge. Again, I was passionate about my topic which made the whole experience a lot less stressful. I said to myself that I was just going to trust my preparation. I got much practice in the delivery and emphasizing of main points. If I had to change some aspect of my presentation, I would stop my hands from moving too much. While I was delivering my speech, I noticed that when I got nervous, I would fidget with my hands. This is something that I have to address next time. I’m still dealing with some of the nerves. I’m striving to find ways to deal with it during the speech.

On another note, my power point had a lot of good information and pictures, but I could have limited the amount of worded information as much as possible. After all, I want my audience to focus on my voice rather than solely the power point. In order to improve the content of my speech, I will use more specific examples and support to supplement my main points. I gave a lot of general information in this speech but I could have used one or two specific examples to enhance the message. I could have used a real life situation in which I could apply some of the techniques of neuro-linguistic programming. As for my delivery, I want to slow down and stop the excessive movement with my hands. My hands were the most distracting part of my speech. It was apparent in my first presentation too. I think that I did not really improve in this area, and it will be something that I will keep in mind as I prepare and delivery my final speech. Compared to my last speech, I was more confident this time around. I used more visual aids, and organized my thoughts a bit better. I think that my first speech had a lot more exciting that pertained to the audience so therefore the second speech was a bit more boring. My eye contact was solid. I would give myself an 8 out of 10 because my eyes were focusing on the computer and the back wall a little more than I would have liked.

Based on my performance, I would give myself between an A and a B. I had a lot of preparation in terms of researching. I was passionate about the subject and I perceived myself as an expert of the subject. Looking back at the video, I looked confident and excited to deliver my speech. I used pictures of each of the books that I had looked at and explained their significance. Overall, I verbally cited all six of the sources that I used. My presentation was not perfect because of several distractions in the delivery; however this does not shadow the fact that I presented pertinent relevant information in a clear and concise fashion.

All in all, I think that my second speech was better than my first because I stuttered a little less and I was more confident that I would give a great show. I was more prepared to back up my main points with the varieties of sources, and I practiced a little more intensely than I did the first time. With a little work on my body language, I can be better prepared to control the gestures I make with my hands. Hopefully, with the third and final speech, I can go out with a BANG and give a performance that everyone can remember for a while.