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Breathing Is the Key to Persuasive Public Speaking
- dpflan 11y agoCoursera has a University of Washington public speaking course, Introduction to Public Speaking. https://www.coursera.org/learn/public-speaking https://www.coursera.org/learn/public-speaking
- thanatropism 11y agoThat's more about organizing a talk in memorable points than overcoming shyness/vocal technique, etc. A lot of it is useful for essay-writing as well. (To be fair: I must have followed through with a third of it before priorities took over)
- dpflan 11y agoYou took the course? Was it not compelling enough to complete?
- thanatropism 11y agoI never complete Coursera courses. That's probably more on me than them.
- dpflan 11y agoIt's not just you (don't blame yourself!). It's almost everyone: MOOC attrition is high and retention is low. The low barrier to access and the even lower repercussions for not finishing are influential: 1. http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/mooc-completion-and-retention-context-student-intent http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/mooc-completion-and-rete... 2. http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-10671-7_4#page-1 http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-10671-7_4... 3. http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/retention-and-intention-massive-open-online-courses-depth-0 http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/retention-and-intention-...
- ajuc 11y agoI've never realized how hard it is to speak publicly until I had to do public presentation. I was so stressed I rushed through the material and I was taking too shallow breaths, too rarely. 20 minutes into presentation I had to make 5-minute pause just to catch some air, I was literally exhausted by talking :) Few people from our team (programmers, ui designers, testers) had presentations, and we all learnt a lot. It's surprisingly hard.
- dpflan 11y agoWhat was the presentation on? Was it a subject matter you know very well? How have subsequent speaking opportunities gone?
- Nimitz14 11y ago...did you not learn how to do presentations in school?
- eitally 11y agoMost people don't. Not that they don't give presentations in school, but they are absolutely not either graded or coached on presentation skills, only on content (since most of the time it's presentation of a research project).
- ajuc 11y agoWe don't really have presentations in Polish schools. Well, maybe now, I've heard on the new college graduation exam (matura) there is sth like this, but when I was in school I didn't have to do any presentations. Usually it's either written exam, test, or oral exam (more like interview than presentation). Also (at least for me) - presentation to friends is completely different thing - I've been active in students club and made a lot of courses (we had this exchange - everybody taught others about his hobby) - it's completely different experience to give a speach for a few friends over a beer, and in huge hall to dozens of strangers.
- jessaustin 11y agoPicture a piece of sashimi: a thin slice of fish over a bed of rice. I think the word you're looking for is "nigiri".
- drb311 11y agoGood breathing will help but it's not the key. The best starting point for nervous public speakers is: http://seriouspony.com/blog/2013/10/4/presentation-skills-considered-harmful http://seriouspony.com/blog/2013/10/4/presentation-skills-co... Focus on their needs not your technique. Everything else is artifice.
- 2close4comfort 11y agoBut without it you would die. So being able to remain conversant and at ease with your topic and audience might also be considered good. Fear of the unknown is what'll get you. I find being nervous helpful in that my habits when nervous are repetitively re-checking my preparations, which usually lead me to finding that key item(s) I might miss if I were more cavalier.
- ThrustVectoring 11y agoI have a suspicion that "focus on their needs" is good advice for social anxiety in general.
- bhartzer 11y agoI did my first presentation at a tech-related conference back in 2003. It took me 10 years and speaking at about 100 conferences to get over the "nervousness" that came before I spoke. Now it's easier for me, it really just takes practice. But it also really, REALLY helps if you know your subject inside-and-out. That way if you start stumbling, you can talk your way through it and 'improvise'.
- rm_-rf_slash 11y agoBreathing is generally underrated as the core of everything you do. A lot of people starting out at Kung Fu tend to get bored and quit after dealing with breathing exercises, but without controlling your breath, you can't expect to fully control your body.
- theseatoms 11y agoLikewise, there is an analogous practice to yoga known as pranayama, the practice the breath (vs the body).
- kelukelugames 11y agoI always forget to breathe when I am deadlifting at the gym or whiteboarding in an interview.
- spdustin 11y agoI've been a public speaker for 12+ years now. I've come up with my own kit of advice for friends / peers / family members who are going to be in front of an audience. Generalizations can be argued against, but in my experience, not successfully. :) Every time you get in front of an audience, remember: they came to see you succeed. Nobody (whose opinion matters) goes to plays, presentations or speeches to watch the on-stage talent crash and burn. They want to be entertained, or to be informed, or to experience catharsis. They have no reason to believe you're not qualified to speak, and they're subconsciously rooting for you because it is rewarding for the audience when you do well, and embarrassing for them when you do not. Bring water. Take pauses every few minutes to take a drink. It helps regulate breathing. Don't use colloquialisms without crafting a turn of phrase that explains it for those who don't understand. Don't use pop-culture references in presentations. Your audience may know you a little from a speaker bio, but you are even less likely to know their cultural background, and the awkward silence that follows a failed "Mr. Burns from The Simpsons" reference will only force you to get inside your own head. Which brings me to: Stay out of your head. Meaning: don't present material that you haven't practiced unless your particular brain excels at improvisation or social engineering, because you can't be THINKING about all that info and your presentation skills WHILE you're presenting. Practice speaking slowly, clearly and authoritatively, know your schedule for the talk, and KNOW YOUR SHIT ( a colloquialism meaning that you should be well-versed in the subject matter of your presentation). If you are unpracticed or only superficially aware of your subject matter, you will make mistakes that you will suddenly find yourself analyzing without your own permission. Your brain will put on the brakes, bringing your presentation to a screeching halt, and start to pick apart every little thing that happened and every little thing you're about to do. When someone "chokes" during a public performance, they've gotten into their own head. "Auto-pilot" - being able to perform without conscious step-by-step thought - is your best weapon here; that only comes from an easy comfort with the material and, unless you're already a skilled public speaker, practice. TL;DR?: Your audience is rooting for you; stop and sip water frequently; don't be a clever wordsmith (or a cunning linguist, if that helps you remember?) unless you know your audience will "get it"; and for the love off all that is good in the world, know the room, know the schedule and know your shit, or you'll choke and that makes a whole room full of people feel much more uncomfortable than you, because when they sat down, they already mentally prepared for you to be good.
- Balgair 11y agoLooking through the comments here really makes me glad I was in the scouts. Putting the long struggle for equal treatment aside for a moment, the scouts did a great job with the public speaking side of things. Most of it was to present to your fellow scouters, and this gave a lot of practice for the young kids. This was especially hard, as most of the people you are trying to teach a knot to are between 11 and 16, not the most disciplined bunch. There were also times when you had to talk to the adults and present your aims and what happened on a raft trip, for example. Though relatively 'lite' in content, my experience was that the adults still expected top notch skill, and then would take the time to build them with you. As such, I always see these tip and tricks pages and think 'Doesn't everyone know that already?' Still, great reminder and good advice from the OP.
- sopooneo 11y agoI would say the single most important part of public speaking, which should encapsulate everything else is rehearse. It can feel weird and contrived to have three of your colleagues sitting in front of you pretending to be an audience, but it's enough to make it feel real, and let you run into most of your issues ahead of the real thing. Then you go back, fix what you can, and rehearse again. You want to have some "muscle memory" to fall back on during the real event.
- santaclaus 11y agoSo true. I've made it a habit of asking speakers of really great talks how many times they rehearse, and I was super surprised to here that speakers often go through 15+ iterations of a talk (half a month, once a day) before giving it.
- noir_lord 11y agoRehearsing in front of a webcam is also very useful. Make sure you are standing up in roughly the position you will be giving your talk in, set it to record and then have at it (I find it helps if you can't see yourself while recording). Then play over the recording, if you use VLC it has a useful trick in that you can speed up playback without affecting pitch (saves time and makes it really obvious at 1.5x if you are talking too fast, you should be legible at 150 percent). Make notes where you stumbled and/or were not clear then go over it again. Oh and if you have slides you can run through them on the machine in front of you (instead of behind your or off to the side) which really helps as well.
- dpflan 11y agoRehearsing in front a webcam seems like one step from submitting your rehearsal to a service that can critique your presentation. The service could go through a checklist of fundamental variables that are deemed highly correlated with successful presentations, and you could receive timely and useful feedback. Is there such a service? @noir_lord
- noir_lord 11y ago
- yellowapple 11y ago"Picture a piece of sashimi: a thin slice of fish over a bed of rice." That ain't sashimi; that's nigiri.