Journal #3
What I found to be significant in chapter 1 was the importance of learning how to speak publicly on different parts of my life such as college, interviewing for jobs, and for a future career. The importance of speech and public speech has already been apparent in my college career so far because some of my classes required some form of public speaking at different points in the course. Also, lots of interviews for jobs aren’t just one on one, some might be one on two, one on three, etc. For a career many companies require many soft skills such as communication which are sometimes more important than some parts of the actual job.
Journal #4
It is small and fits in my hand perfectly. Its overall color is black, but it has blue, yellow, green and red buttons. There are control knobs and USB ports, a power button. It has a d-pad and thumb sticks that rotate 360 degrees to navigate the platform. It requires AA batteries. It’s my gateway to entertainment and a way to stay in touch with friends who live far away. There is a port at the bottom that accepts headsets and headset adapters to be able to hear what is happening on the screen and to potentially hear friends talking or opponents in the same game lobby. I am describing my XBOX controller.
I would say that my XBOX controller is the small object in my house that gets the most use from me. It’s significant because the thing that my controller is connected to (my XBOX), is extremely versatile and eats up a lot of my time throughout the day. I usually start off the day by getting a glass of water and some food and then watching YouTube on my XBOX. After that, I take a shower and then pick the controller back up to play some NHL 22. And eventually I end up watching hockey games or watching Netflix at night on my XBOX. My controller is important to me because it is a symbol of entertainment which is something that I and most other humans value highly.
Outline
Description:
- Plastic
- Colored buttons
- Thumb sticks
- Requires AA batteries
- Can be used as a means of communication
Significance:
- Most used object
- I use it to play games and watch TV/sports/movies
- Eats up time
Journal #5
Chapter 13 taught me that outlines are enormously helpful for performing a successful speech. An outline is kind of like a cheat sheet if you have rehearsed well enough for your speech. Using an outline presents the speaker an opportunity to create a visual representation of all of their points indented in hierarchal fashion based off of relative importance. It is important to create a working outline first, which is basically your speech. It should contain partial or full sentences. The next step is to create a speaking outline which should contain phrases and key words. The condensed version of an outline is important because it gives the speaker phrases to help jog their memory during a speech without having to break eye contact with the audience for too long. Outlines act as written practice for a speech and I think that’s crucial in getting your mind ready to present.
Journal #6
The process of this speech #3 has been an important one when it comes to improving my public speaking abilities. I think that I started out well with my dry-run because I improved on limiting my unnecessary head movements and umms weren’t as prevalent either. I really think that it’s important to have a group that gives feedback on the dry run because they can point out flaws that I as a speaker would have never noticed. We can do research and improve on things in our own speeches but it’s nice to get an authentic answer from a real person that is in the same course. Something that I can definitely improve on though is my swallowing habit. Whenever I move from point to point while I’m speaking, I’ve noticed that I have this nervous look on my face and simultaneously swallow my own saliva. It looks weird and I myself was distracted by it so I need to improve on that.
Journal #7
In my honest opinion, I think that public speaking at special events is extremely boring and predictable. Like we get it, someone has to gather everyone’s attention at some point in the event, but in reality nobody wants to hear it. Everyone is there to drink and have a good time. It even says in chapter 25 that people go by the norms that everyone anticipates when speaking for specific occasions which makes it all the more boring. Anyways, what I got out of the chapter is that you should rehearse before speaking on special occasions and you should speak clearly and in a fashion that people can easily follow. It’s also important to praise people when the occasion comes and for other instances, acknowledgement of involved individuals is a norm. All in all, speakers at an event are supposed to be predictable and that’s just how the world is I guess.
Journal #8
After sending my final speech for speech #4, I can look back and say that I improved. I had a few instances in the speech where I got stuck for a second or two but I just kept going like you would have to in a real public speaking setting instead of scrapping the video entirely and starting over. I’d say that my speech wasn’t as perfect as some of my other speeches, but it was more authentic. I think my ability to speak on a whim has improved with this speech considering how many times I used to start my old videos off. I was conscious enough to not move around too much and do that thing where I swallow nothing as a stalling mechanism in between topics. I also think that my introduction, thesis, and ending all tied together better than any of my past speeches.
Journal #9
Persuading people to think the way that you do is an extremely complicated thing to accomplish. Chapter 23 explains that there are three fundamental approaches to connect with the audience (logos, pathos, and ethos). All of these concepts are important to use because you need to have logic behind what you’re preaching (logos), and you need to “target audience members’ feelings about the speaker’s character through demonstrations of trustworthiness, competence, and concern for their welfare,” (ethos). However, I think that the most important approach is to create a sense of emotion or passion in what you say (pathos) because us humans are very emotional beings and words when being used to convince somebody of something should illicit feelings good or bad because we tend to forget a lot of things that happen in our lives, but we can always remember how we felt about things. As for chapter 24, the construction of a persuasive speech is exactly the same as formatting a regular essay. It consists of claim, evidence, and warrant (argument).
Journal #10
MY BIGGEST STRIDES
I think that speech #3 was the speech where I started to conduct myself a lot better in front of the camera. I had gotten feedback from a peer about some bad habits that I have while speaking, and not having noticed those things at first, or that they were a problem, I started to improve drastically. I think that how you portray yourself in a speech is even more important than the speech itself because body language and ticks and habits can be distracting if not done properly. The goal is to show the audience that you are confident and passionate about the words that you’re preaching so that the energy that you exude in your speech resonates better with the audience. People are much more willing to listen to somebody that has their body under control and looks poised and confident because energy radiates from person to person and you want to show yourself in the best light possible.
Speech 2 dry-run: Speech 2
Speech 2 Final: https://youtu.be/ir7YyWuUGrk
Final Journal #11
After completing my final speech, I can honestly say that I thought I did well. I prepared a good outline that was very detailed even though it’s recommended that they are not that way, but that’s just the only way that my brain lets me do them. My speech was a good length and I thought that I was composed with my body language in front of the camera. I gave an honest reflection on how I thought that the class went for me and that was that I improved my speaking ability not just in front of the camera for my speeches, but outside of class as well. I found that the difficulty of coming up with 3-4 sentences on what my peers could improve on helped me get better at problem solving because I had to come up with a certain amount of words to meet the requirement. As for the speech, I thought that I got my point across well and convinced the audience that I should pass the class. Some things that I could have done better however, were that I said umm a few times, I moved my head in an odd manner once or twice, and I did that weird swallow thing once.
