For my first speech in COMS 101, I chose to do an oral interpretation. I read an excerpt from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. I started with an introduction asking the audience if anyone has read this play and then briefly explaining the plot of the play before starting. Then, I delivered the excerpt deliberately leaving pauses as practiced. For my first speech, I did better than I expected. The feedback I received from my team members was that they liked that I explained the background because it helped those who haven’t read it. My team also said that my delivery was good and the pauses were in the proper places. I also received feedback that my eye contact was good, my speed and volume were effective, and I was able to make Shakespeare seem more interesting, which I think is a pretty difficult task. I remember reading Shakespeare in high school and not being able to follow too well. However, preparing for my speech, I watched YouTube videos of people performing parts of his plays and I drew my inspiration (including pacing and tone) from these videos. It was really nice to hear this positive feedback from my peers and my professor.
For the next speech, I chose to talk about a current event. Since I religiously follow current events, I was really excited to start preparing for this speech. I talked about how Project Loon just got permission to send 30 balloons up over Puerto Rico to give them emergency LTE service. Even though other students talked about the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, I thought my topic was different because I focused on talking about relief efforts. Before this speech, I was less nervous than I was before delivering my first speech. However, I felt as if my body was fidgeting more than the first time when I was actually delivering my speech. I need to work on hand gestures because I think if I used hand gestures then the rest of my body wouldn’t move as much. I also think I should put my hair in a ponytail or tie half of it back because I felt like it was blocking part of my face. This could make me lose credibility if not everyone can see my facial expressions and eyes because oftentimes someone’s eyes say a lot about them. The feedback I received was that the delivery was really good and it was easy to follow because the structure had good organization. I think my speech connected with people because I started with a topic that we are all familiar with: Google. A critique I received was that I needed to make more eye contact and slow down a little. My speech was one minutes and fifty four seconds in front of the class; however, when I practiced it in my dorm room, it was a little over 2 minutes. I need to pay attention to my speed and be able to deliver it at the same speed I practice it at. I also need to work on including all of the elements of introductions that were in the textbook: get the audience’s attention, introduce the subject, give the audience a reason to listen, establish your credibility, preview your main ideas. For this speech, I needed to better establish my credibility, which I will work on for my next speech. Overall, I was satisfied with my second speech because I believe I can only improve from here and I know what I need to work on.
With these two speeches I have definitely come closer to reaching my goals set in my first entry for the E-Portfolio of getting less nervous and having a more organized structure.
Site Title 