Reflection on Intro Speech

Preparing for the introductory speech was easy because all I had to do was pick a hobby or an interesting fact about me and talk about it. It was also easy because it didn't require any research or memorization for that matter since it was something that came from inside as opposed to a current event or something like that. But actually doing it was harder than expected because one minute is much less than I thought.
I chose to talk about the cultural differences between USA and Brazil because that is something that affected me a lot when I came here and it also made me grow as a person as I was faced with cultural challenges.  This speech taught me that breathing is very important during the speech and something I need to work on next time.
First, I couldn't seem to get rid of irrelevant or not-so-important details about what I was talking about to get it down to one minute. It was hard to choose which information was more important for the audience that didn't know me at all. Therefore this is definitely something I need to work on so I don't loose points for going over the time limit due to details that sometimes make the speech too complicated or long. I need to understand that its better to choose one or two key points and inform only the necessary details about them.
I don't have a problem asking questions or saying stuff in class but I get nervous when I have to go to the front of the class to talk. For a second I blanked and forgot what I was talking about and I also tend to speak faster, so I need to learn how to pace myself. Therefore I need to work on my nervousness  jitters for the next speech since its gonna be much longer and on a topic that needs much more preparation.
Overall the speech went well but here's some stuff I need to work on for the next one to be even better. 

Intro Speech - Robin Hansel

Picking out items from my life to talk about was harder than I expected. Obviously I know myself pretty well, and summarizing 21-years of life in 60 seconds seems inadequate. However, there isn't a lot of information that is really that interesting to those who don't know me. I tried to relate it to the class and talk about USC and how I ended up there, but I am looking forward to other speeches as a chance to discuss a more interesting topic.

My speech ended up being less than a minute. I believe this is for two reasons. The first is simply that I talk fast when I'm nervous. The second reason, however, is that I believe I actually became more clear and concise. This may mean I need to practice more to get to that point before I give the speech in class, but it may also mean that a little pressure helps me to perform and stay focused.

            Our first in-class speech was an introductory speech about ourselves, a topic that I am happy to say that I didn’t have to do much research on. In preparation for the speech, I read over the guidelines, made a note of the directions and any suggestions that I should consider. I especially liked that Cynthia put down certain questions that we should think of when preparing for our speech, because it helped me construct the things I wanted to talk about. I thought it was especially important to keep in mind that I didn’t know anyone in the class, give or take a few people, and that we were only given a minute to speak, so it was vital that I introduce key points about myself that would give everyone a better idea of who I am. Obviously my name would be the most important and then where I’m from since I do strongly identify with being a Californian and I think that says a lot about me. I wanted to announce my major, minor, and what I was aspiring to be since being a senior means that I’m graduating and entering the real world. I then thought it would be nice to mention that I just turned 21 because my birthday was a huge part of my summer and it would be a nice introduction into my study abroad semester. My semester in Amsterdam is very important to me and is something I think other college students can relate to especially if they traveled abroad as well, plan to do so in the future, or know people who have.

            There were a few challenges I had to overcome which was mostly the time limit. Not that I’m saying I have a lot to talk about, but trying to keep within the time limit proved to be a little difficult since I had no idea how much time was passing. Also since I had already thought about what I wanted to say, I found myself trying to recite my words in the exact way that I practiced it and when I forgot, I stumbled a bit. I think to overcome these challenges in the future I will remind myself that I don’t have to recite the notecard exactly the way I practice it, as long as I mention what I want to say it will be fine. I will also practice more, and give myself time in order to fit within the time range.

            On the other hand, I think I did well to memorize as many big ideas as I could about the things I wanted to talk about without reciting off of a piece of paper. For some reason I wasn’t as nervous presenting as I was when we did the pop speech probably because I had time to think about the subject, the speech didn’t come as a surprise to me, the subject was something I was very knowledgeable about, and I was about to recite it many times in my head.

Introduction Speech

The Introduction Speech did not take too much preparation because it was a short minute informative speech about myself. Since the speech was about myself, I did not have to do any additional research which made preparation easy. During the process of preparing my speech, I learned that it was very important to only include vital and interesting information order to keep it within the time limit and to keep the audience engaged at the same time. I realized that including “fluff” information only distracts the audience and can sometimes even bore and disengage them from the speaker.

I thought that that this speech was somewhat fun in that it was a fun way of getting to know my classmates. Also, a lot of people shared their activities during the summer (which consisted of a lot of traveling) which was also very interesting to listen to. This introductory speech was important to me because this was my classmates “first impression” of me. It was also a chance for me my classmates to get to know me better being that I did not know any of them. 

As for my speech, I was able to make eye contact with my peers instead of reading off my notes. However, for my next speech I hope to slow down when I talk and use less “um’s” and “likes.” I was initially nervous but as I continued my speech, I found it comforting when the audience interacted with me by making eye contact, nodding, and smiling. Overall, I thought that audience engagement was very important to me in that it helped me feel less nervous.  

Intro Speech Reflection - Jo

Overall, the introduction speech was pretty fun to prepare. It's an easy and fun topic. The speech was meaningful to me, because it allowed me to share with others what I wanted them to know about me. Since I had to write an introduction paper for another class, I based my speech off of that. However, I needed to shorten the length greatly for the speech to be under 90 seconds. 

One challenge that I faced while practicing for the speech was fitting it under 90 seconds but over one minute. It's pretty easy for me either be just above 90 seconds or just below a minute. 

During the actual speech, I got pretty nervous. I tried to calm down before the starting the speech, but I got nervous anyways. Next time, I need to remind myself to take breaths before moving on to the next sentence and to slow down. I could have also worked a bit more on the organization of my speech. I liked how Summer used a hook to draw in her listeners and then stated the three main points she wanted to focus on. 

As for what I did well, I think I was able to make pretty good eye contact and not look down on my notecard too much. I was also glad that I didn't memorize my speech word for word--which is what I normally do.

Intro Speech Reflection

I think that, overall, today's speeches all went very well. Everyone was very enthusiastic and engaging while speaking.

For me personally, preparation for this speech was fairly easy. It took a little bit of time to think about which details of my life would seem most interesting to my peers, but because I've been playing so many fun fact games lately it was pretty quick. I felt that the facts I ended up including were unique and told my life story in a fun way.

Because I volunteered to go first, I wasn't as nervous as I would have been had I been waiting in the audience first. I usually prefer to go first and get my presentation over-with with any class/project. I especially wanted to go first for this speech because I am sick and don't feel my best, so I was a little more nervous to present in front of a classroom of people.

I feel that I did very well with even eye contact and timing. Because I practiced my speech beforehand with a timer, I knew that I was within the 60-90 second timeframe.

One thing that I could definitely work on is saying "um" less while speaking. Getting rid of those filler words will make me come across as more confident, which is something that I hope to improve on during this course.  

Introduction Speech

Preparing my Introduction Speech was not very difficult, if I'm being honest. It was a great topic to talk about because it was something I was completely knowledgeable about. That's half the battle in preparing a speech so it was easy to brainstorm what I would be sharing with my classmates. In preparing, I also made sure to pay attention to how soft or loud I was speaking. I didn't want to put people to sleep so I made sure to make my speech as energetic sounding as possible. Repeating the speech over and over again while I prepared made it easy to determine when I should raise my voice to catch my classmate's attention.

I think I could have worked on the organization of my speech a little more but overall I'm happy with how it turned out and I think the audience learned a great deal about me and definitely what is most important about me (that I love animals and my job). I learned that it's important to make a connection with the audience in one way or another, in order to keep them interested in the topic. This speech topic was important to me because it was the first time I was telling my classmates about what's most valuable to me and why.

I think I delivered well and that I was within the 60-90 second time frame that we had to stay within. I also think I did a good job keeping the audience's attention the entire time and refrained from using "um" and "like". Overall, my one suggestion I'd have for myself is to make more eye contact with the audience. I found myself wanting to look at the professor most of the time and tried to remind myself to scan the room instead. I really liked this assignment and I'm looking forward to seeing how I adapt to some of the longer speeches we get to do later on in the semester!