What speech I am choosing
I will be choosing how to become a better version of yourself academically. One way I will connect is trying not to look down when i’m speaking. That’s how I will improve my stance while reading. Then I will connect with the audience by starting off with growing up. I was always one to stress over my grades and needing everything to be turned in on time. Having this mentality growing up was a bad thing for me, personally. On top of wanting everything to be good, I was a hard core procrastinator (still am.) I’m usually up super late trying to finish my work because I still want it to be turned in on time and good. I have had many sleepless nights due to my procrastination. Also within class I want to talk about the trouble of staying focused. I believe this has to do with the lack of sleep I get due to how late I do my homework/studying. I have selected this topic because I think it will be good for me to reflect on everything I will be saying. As I write these words now, I realize how unhealthy this is for my mental health. I have developed anxiety since starting college which I never had in high school. I truly do want to better my academic self. I want to be able to do my work throughout a period of time, not just a last minute rush and finish everything at once. I want this project to help me see what I am saying and take accountability for my issues. I believe I will want to start my speech by announcing the reason I am choosing this topic. Which I will talk about how unhealthy this is for my mental health and the goals for trying to better myself first through the academic process to life outside of school. I might talk about how this is normal and I am not alone in this struggle.
Outlines: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Rxpxsul7COtB0Krj13tMWP1WrmdmpvAIDu1-am5Xn54/edit
Reflection after first round of peer review/ advice given and received:
Doing this speech practice was super helpful for me to just get some jitters out. I am not the best public speaker when it comes to memorizing a speech or anything like that. Some positive feedback I got was that my speech was very relatable. And that’s good because I definitely tried to stick to a topic most college students would agree with. I was also told that I was funny at times, which honestly I wasn’t trying to be but it’s a good thing I was because I wasn’t giving the best speaking so I was glad to hear I was relatable and funny. What I was told I need to work on mostly was not looking at my laptop the entire time I’m talking. When I do any public speaking my mind goes blank and I forget everything so I used my laptop the whole time this practice round. I’m hoping for the next time I can move from my laptop a little then by finally be off completely.
My best advice to people would be the same as I was given. Being able to make eye contact and use your laptop less and less. It was everyone’s first time so I’m sure everybody had jitters but once people started it got way easier.
Reflection after second round of peer review/ advice given and received: After this round of peer review I feel I have a better sense of myself in a way. Watching the video that was filmed of myself I can see plenty of things I did wrong that I know I can work on. When I get nervous I tend to just start laughing at everything that happens within my video a few times. While trying to do my speech without looking at my laptop I skipped over a few things I had done that could make my speech longer. I overall just need to look less nervous because my speaking is not necessarily the problem, it’s my body language. A few notes I got from my peers was just to keep practicing speaking in front of people in general. Maybe have a group of friends watch me give the speech as practice for the real thing. I also need to work on eye contact because that barely happened in my practice run. I enjoyed getting to listen to others do their speech as a way to help me with things i can do that they did why they did there speech. I want to just adjust some points I made just to make them clear and less wordy. I like that my speech doesn’t sound like the others. I made my speech explaining what to do to better myself and I feel mine was a little different from the others.
Overall reflection: As I look back on the process of this speech, I am so happy it went better than I expected. Going into this project I was so nervous to give a speech. I feel I am fine talking in front of people but the second you call it a speech I freak out. I am so happy with how I presented and I feel I made great improvement from the first time we presented in front of our small groups. I went from reading my speech word for word off my laptop to just need small glances at my notes in front of the whole class. Doing peer review in small groups I feel really helped me with overall jitters, knowing people around me were just as nervous definitely helped. I enjoyed learning from others when they gave their speeches so I could take away some positive things I learned from my peers. I was dreading the final presentation for days, then it got pushed back farther which made me even more nervous. I was completely fine once I was up there, I had just never given a true speech before. As i even said in my speech, procrastination will be the death of me. For the next project if its a speech, i will practice reading out loud earlier.
