The body of a speech. In this lesson, you will learn about planning considerations to keep in mind when developing and organizing your ideas. If a presentation were a burger, the body would be the juicy middle. It is the most delicious, most nutritious part. It is what you want your audience to learn. Eating a burger is fun, as long as the chef did a good job of cooking it. For a presenter, that means following task instructions. If the presentation is a course assignment, the professor will usually give you a handout with written instructions. Read them carefully and pay careful attention when the professor is explaining the requirements and answering questions about them. If the presentation is not a course assignment, find out as much as you can about the event. As the organizers, you must fulfill all expectations. Otherwise, no matter how much time you spend preparing, your presentation will not be successful. You may even get a failing grade or review for not adhering to instructions. One detail to consider is the length of time that you have for the presentation itself. This is the time allotment for a typical 8-10 minute presentation. Plan accordingly. Articulate presenter speak around 130 words per minute. An eight minute speech is about 1,040 words. Nervous speakers speak much faster, but avoid doing this. The audience needs you to articulate, to speak clearly. To know exactly how longer speech is, you will need to rehearse it out loud. Time yourself. You may need to add more information to your speech, delete some information from it, or adjust your talking speed. Another aspect to consider is the organization of your ideas. If the presentation is a course assignment, your professor will probably provide guidance about the required sections. Use the same headings in the same order that the professor expects. If you're being asked to present a summary of a written work, mirror the sections. Follow the same headings that were used in the scholarly article, textbook chapter, or research paper. If you are given freedom to choose your own organization, divide your content into 2-5 manageable sections. For example, if you're presenting about a global issue such as population growth, you can divide your content into two sections, a description of the problem, and then the solutions that you recommend. Or, you can choose to divide it into four sections, the history of this problem, current conditions that are still causing the problem, the advantages and disadvantages of alternative solutions, and then your recommended course of action for solving the problem. Last but not least, notice how your presentation will be assessed. Will you be judged formally or informally? For a course assignment, the professor will probably give you a scoring rubric. At formal conferences, it is common to provide anonymous questionnaires to the audience to see how they really felt. Even if it is an informal presentation in which you will not receive written feedback, your performance may affect your reputation with your colleagues and clients. There are two main assessment criteria, content and delivery. Content may include how accurate, how informative your information was, how interesting, how persuasive your ideas were, whether you were a valuable member if the tasks required teamwork, and whether you clearly did research and cited your references. Delivery may include verbal features like talking speed or audibility, non verbal features like eye contact or enthusiasm, and visual aids like effective use of props or PowerPoint. Sometimes you'll be assessed on only content. Other times, you'll be assessed on both content and delivery. Now that you know the expectations, you can do your research more efficiently. Reading isn't enough. You must understand the subject matter inside and out. As the presenter, you're the expert. Use your critical thinking skills to help you. First off, be thorough. Actively consider all facets such as rationales, why does this phenomenon happen? Caveats, is this true in all cases, or are there exceptions? What conditions must be met? Counter arguments, what do other people believe? How would you refute their doubts? You should also be thorough about the types of evidence that you present. Offer diversity of supporting materials, such as definitions of abstract or technical terms, descriptions of salient characteristics, or step-by-step processes using vivid exact vocabulary. Examples, analogies and stories to clarify unfamiliar concepts. Statistics, numbers, percentages to quantify range. Illustrations, charts, tables to help the audience visualize your ideas. Testimony, quotations, paraphrases from other people. In addition to including many types of evidence, it is important to check its validity. Where would it be better to get a definition? Your textbook or the Internet? Your textbook, of course. For stats, which one is stronger, results from one study or multiple studies that show the same result? Choose confirmed studies and statistics. Whose testimony carries more weight? Experts like doctors or a close friend? Expert testimony is better. Finally, be truthful. Present your facts honestly. Don't exaggerate, lie, omit, or distort any evidence. Don't plagiarize either. You must be prepared to cite the sources of your information. Dishonesty will hurt your credibility as a speaker. Therefore, when quoting or paraphrasing someone, say the original author's name. For example, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill once said that, "He who fails to plan is planning to fail." By carefully following instructions and conducting research, you are planning to succeed.
