10. Beginning and Ending Your Speech

1. AL AKHAWAYN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES COMMUNICATIONS STUDIES 10. Beginning and Ending Your Speech Lecture by Dr. Mohammed Ibahrine based on Clella Jaffe’s Public Speaking

2. Structure of the Lecture • 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.1. Gain Attention • 1.1.1 Ask Question • 1.1.2 Provide a Vivid Description • 1.1.3 Begin with a Question • 1.1.4. Use an Audio or Visual Aid

3. Structure of the Lecture • 1.1.5 Tell a Joke or Funny Story • 1.1.6 Refer to a Current Event • 1.1.7 Begin with an Example • 1.1.8. Start with Startling Numbers

4. Structure of the Lecture • 1.2 Give your audience a Reason to listen • 1.3 Establish your Credibility • 1.4 Preview Your Ideas

5. Structure of the Lecture • 2. Conclude With Impact • 2.1 Signal the Ending • 2.2 Review Your Main Ideas • 2.3 Provide Psychological Closure • 2.4 End Memorably

6. Structure of the Lecture • 3. Connect Your Ideas • 3.1 Signposts and Transitions • 3.2 Internal Previews and Internal Summaries

7. Associative Statement • Organized thought is the basis of organized action Alfred North Whitehead

8. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.1. Gain Attention • Gaining attention is the first step in the listening process, so you must immediately answer your listener's question: • “What is this speech about” • Introduce your topic in a creative way • Good speakers often choose more effective techniques

9. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.1. Gain Attention • Strategies for introductions • Ask a question • Provide a vivid description • Begin with a quotation • Use an audio or visual aid • Tell a joke or funny story • Refer to a current event • Begin with an example • Start with stating numbers

10. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.1. Gain Attention • Choose either a rhetorical or participatory question • Rhetorical questions are the kind listeners answer in their mind • Participatory questions call for an overt response

11. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.1. Gain Attention • Provide a vivid description • Draw your audience’s attention to your subject by describing a scene in such vivid language that your listeners are compelled to visualize it mentally • The scene can be either real or imagery

12. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Begin with a quotation • You can often gain listener attentions with a quotation or a familiar cultural proverb • Choose a saying that encapsulates your overall theme and cite its source

13. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Use an Audio or visual aid • Posters • Charts • Tape recordings • Other visual and audio materials • successfully in drawing attention to your topic

14. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Tell a joke or funny story • Professional speakers often begin by telling a joke that creates an informal, humorous atmosphere at the outset of the speech • Make sure your joke relates to the topic of your speech

15. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Refer to a Current event or recent happenings • To identify with your listeners and establish common ground, you can begin with well-known current happenings

16. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Begin with an Example • Examples provide your listeners with the opportunity to become emotionally involved with your topic • We generally become more attentive, when we hear a of real people involved in real situations

17. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Start with Startling Numbers • Cite a little-known facts • Numbers can be dry • They, however, can also capture and hold your listeners attention if they are shocking enough or if they are put into an understandable context

18. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.2 Give Your Audience a Reason to Listen • Once you have your listener's attention, start answering their questions “Why should I listen to to this speech” • You can frame your topic within a larger issue • Stress the importance of the topic

19. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.3 Establish your Credibility • After you have the audience’s attention • Give them a reason to listen by briefly sharing your subject-related experiences, interest, and research findings • Express similarities with the audience • Establish a speaker-audience-topic relationship by expressing pleasure in addressing the audience

20. 1. Plan Your Introduction • 1.4 Preview Your Ideas • Give a detailed orientation that previews what you will cover • “Tell them what you are going to say; say it; tell them what you said” • The preview is the short statement you make as the transition between the introduction and the body of your speech in which you state some form of your central idea • Preview helps listeners who are taking notes or outlining the talk

21. 1. Plan Your Introduction • Some common faults of introduction • Do not apologize • Do not make hollow promises • Do not rely on Gimmicks • Do not preface your introduction (before I begin my talk, I want)

22. 2. Conclude with Impact • 2.1 Signal the Ending • Signals make the audience aware that you are concluding • Both beginning and professionals use common phases such as “In conclusion” or “Finally” • Do not overlook nonverbal actions as way to signal to your conclusion

23. 2. Conclude with Impact • 2.1 Signal the Ending • Do not overlook nonverbal actions as a way to signal to your conclusion • Pause and shift your posture • Take a step away from the podium • Slow down a bit • Speak more softly • Combining both verbal and nonverbal transitions generally works well

24. 2. Conclude with Impact • 2.2 Review Your Main Ideas • Briefly summarizing your main points fulfills the “Tell them what you said” axiom

25. 2. Conclude with Impact • 2.3 Provide Psychological Closure • Looping back to something from your introduction - which one professor calls an “echo” provides your audience with a sense of psychological closure

26. 2. Conclude with Impact • 2.4 End Memorably • Finally, plan to leave a positive and memorable impression • End with impact by choosing some of the same types of material you used to gain attention in the beginning: • End with humor • Ask a thought-provoking question • Use a quotation • Issue a challenge • Tie the subject to a larger cultural theme or value

27. 2. Conclude with Impact • Some common faults of conclusion • Do not introduce new material • Do not dilute your position (This info is dated, but it was all I could find) Credibility • Do not drag out your conclusion (do not prolong)

28. 3. Connect Your Ideas • 3.2 Internal Previews and Internal Summaries • Internal interviews occur within he body of your speech and briefly summarize the sub points you will develop under a major point • Connective are words, phrases and complete sentences you will use to connect your ideas to one another and to your speech as a whole

29. 3. Connect Your Ideas • 3.2 Internal Previews and Internal Summaries • Take your listeners from their various mental worlds and move them into the world of your speech • Do this by gaining their attention, relating your topic to their concerns, establishing your credibility on the subject, and previewing your main points

30. 3. Connect Your Ideas • 3.2 Internal Previews and Internal Summaries • Plan a conclusion that provides a transition from the body • Summarizes your major points • Gives a sense of closure by referring back to the introduction • Leave your listeners with a challenge or memorable saying

31. 3. Connect Your Ideas • 3.2 Internal Previews and Internal Summaries • Throughout your speech, use connectives to weave your points and subpoints into a coherent whole

32. Summary • After you have organized the body of your speech, • Plan an introduction that will take your listeners from their various internal mental worlds and move them into the world of your speech • Throughout your speech, use connectives to weave your points and sub points into a coherent whole