For the third speech round, I gave a Monroe’s Motivational Sequence Speech on Walmart. My argument was that we should not go to Walmart because of its detrimental impact on society and instead we should support Mom and Pop stores. I worked on this paper all throughout Thanksgiving break doing research through the library database as well as other Internet sources. I felt very prepared during the speech in terms of the information presented, however, I did not spend enough time practicing it out loud and it came off as I was reading it. There was so much information that had to be presented with the ten verbally cited sources. I did, however, feel confident in the content I was presenting because I actually feel very passionate about this topic. The positive feedback I received from my teammates were that I was well prepared, I seemed calm and composed, I had a good speaking voice, and my introduction had a hook that made people want to listen. The negative feedback I received from my teammates and professor were that I did not have enough eye contact and I made some fidget movements. I basically received the same feedback from everyone in my group. I was definitely intimidated by the length of the speech, but I think I did my best. I wish I memorized the main points better so that I could have made better eye contact.
I think the best speech I gave in the entirety of this class is my life philosophy speech. I felt very prepared and I did not get the nervous feeling that I got before every other speech. I was able to make a lot of eye contact because I memorized a lot of the points that I was going to make. Also, since I was about to tell stories about myself, it was more conversational which is the goal of this class. My goals going into this class were to not get as nervous and to have well organized speeches. I think I accomplished these goals by the end of the class. I really focused on the structure and had an extensive outline for every speech. Also, I think just giving so many speeches made me less nervous. Also, the fact that everyone else was giving a speech too and probably felt just as nervous. The people in my COMS class were also very supportive and I didn’t feel judged, so that made my nerves calm down as well. Overall, this class was very neat because I never thought I would be able to know everyone’s name in a public college course. The assignments were challenging, but I improved a lot and I will use my newly gained skills in other courses at Cal Poly and in my life.