4 ms·

I was a disaster at speaking until I was in grad school and had to teach classes (6+ hours/week). At some point you get enough volume and it becomes no big deal

I was a disaster at speaking until I was in grad school and had to teach classes (6+ hours/week). At some point you get enough volume and it becomes no big deal. You start focusing on trying to educate or amuse your audience and are no longer nervous. The key is to get enough practice. Toastmasters is one way to get started, but nothing beats the volume you get by signing up to teach a class several times a week.

Loughla 7y ago
I'll second this. There is nothing like teaching to get your ability to publicly speak built up. I was garbage at public speaking until I had to teach an ed. law course in graduate school. Now I'm exceptional at it. It also helps if it's a subject you're super knowledgeable about. That helps.
hammerbrostime 7y ago
Same experience here with teaching, it has had a huge secondary benefit for me in that I know how to run a room. I also highly recommend running a meetup.
SeanBoocock 7y ago
Yeah this was a big one for me. TAing classes as an undergrad and then running classes as a grad student removed a lot of the anxiety. I still have some level of nerves, but it feels like it comes from a healthier place and isn’t crippling. Also helps to fail in low(er) stakes situations and realize that the world goes on afterwards.
thomasjudge 7y ago
There are also other venues for teaching that one can explore - extension classes, etc. I paid for my summers in grad school by teaching test prep classes. Was pretty awesome once I could focus mainly on the grad classes - LSAT, GMAT, GRE. But great teaching and public speaking experience.
Ididntdothis 7y ago
If you are like me (super shy and self conscious) I definitely would do toastmasters first before doing a lot of teaching. I did teaching for a while but I wasn’t ready so I just kept piling up more and more bad experiences without getting better. After a year of toastmasters I had a pretty good foundation and finally could actually improve. It feels like going into a country without ang knowledge of the language. You can be there for years and never learn anything. But once you have a foundation then learning is possible.
walshemj 7y ago
Me to I was nervous, but when I was 20 or so I joined a group in the UK 18 Plus (now just Plus) similar to Rotaract. I joined the committee and I was my job to stand up and announce the next weeks events, I used to imagine putting on circus masters top hat to get over my nerves. I ended up going to various conferences run on formal lines and speaking at those. I have also gone to a large number of "political" conferences run on formal lines (think roberts rules) both as delegates and standing order committees - which organize the formalities of business. I was on may way to a meeting and bumped into John Bercow on his way to the house of commons, unfortunately I did not have my copy of Citrine other wise id have asked him to sign it. Simon Lancaster has a good book on a mechanics of rhetoric and speech writing https://www.amazon.co.uk/Simon-Lancaster/e/B005NAQX8U/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Simon-Lancaster/e/B005NAQX8U/ref=dp...
moron4hire 7y ago
That's basically how I did it, too. Teaching martial arts classes 3 to 5 times a week, for 3 hours a night (though that was many years and many beers ago). My coworkers remark on how well I speak in public, and while I get that from their perspective it's a scary thing, to me it's just another job. If you're in a reasonably sized city, there are probably dozens of tech meetups looking for content. Just start hanging out and you'll start seeing opportunities to talk. Take them. Also, when you're just starting out, stick to topics you know inside out. Only write enough notes to remind yourself of what you want to talk about. And then just talk to everyone. Don't make it a "presentation". Too much detail and you might get worried about sticking to the material. Just wing it.

Loughla 7y ago

I'll second this. There is nothing like teaching to get your ability to publicly speak built up. I was garbage at public speaking until I had to teach an ed. law course in graduate school. Now I'm exceptional at it. It also helps if it's a subject you're super knowledgeable about. That helps.

hammerbrostime 7y ago

Same experience here with teaching, it has had a huge secondary benefit for me in that I know how to run a room. I also highly recommend running a meetup.

SeanBoocock 7y ago

Yeah this was a big one for me. TAing classes as an undergrad and then running classes as a grad student removed a lot of the anxiety. I still have some level of nerves, but it feels like it comes from a healthier place and isn’t crippling. Also helps to fail in low(er) stakes situations and realize that the world goes on afterwards.

thomasjudge 7y ago

There are also other venues for teaching that one can explore - extension classes, etc. I paid for my summers in grad school by teaching test prep classes. Was pretty awesome once I could focus mainly on the grad classes - LSAT, GMAT, GRE. But great teaching and public speaking experience.

Ididntdothis 7y ago

If you are like me (super shy and self conscious) I definitely would do toastmasters first before doing a lot of teaching. I did teaching for a while but I wasn’t ready so I just kept piling up more and more bad experiences without getting better. After a year of toastmasters I had a pretty good foundation and finally could actually improve. It feels like going into a country without ang knowledge of the language. You can be there for years and never learn anything. But once you have a foundation then learning is possible.

walshemj 7y ago

Me to I was nervous, but when I was 20 or so I joined a group in the UK 18 Plus (now just Plus) similar to Rotaract. I joined the committee and I was my job to stand up and announce the next weeks events, I used to imagine putting on circus masters top hat to get over my nerves. I ended up going to various conferences run on formal lines and speaking at those. I have also gone to a large number of "political" conferences run on formal lines (think roberts rules) both as delegates and standing order committees - which organize the formalities of business. I was on may way to a meeting and bumped into John Bercow on his way to the house of commons, unfortunately I did not have my copy of Citrine other wise id have asked him to sign it. Simon Lancaster has a good book on a mechanics of rhetoric and speech writing https://www.amazon.co.uk/Simon-Lancaster/e/B005NAQX8U/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Simon-Lancaster/e/B005NAQX8U/ref=dp...

moron4hire 7y ago

That's basically how I did it, too. Teaching martial arts classes 3 to 5 times a week, for 3 hours a night (though that was many years and many beers ago). My coworkers remark on how well I speak in public, and while I get that from their perspective it's a scary thing, to me it's just another job. If you're in a reasonably sized city, there are probably dozens of tech meetups looking for content. Just start hanging out and you'll start seeing opportunities to talk. Take them. Also, when you're just starting out, stick to topics you know inside out. Only write enough notes to remind yourself of what you want to talk about. And then just talk to everyone. Don't make it a "presentation". Too much detail and you might get worried about sticking to the material. Just wing it.