Over the course of speech class, I feel like I have grown so much. I remember when we had to do the monologues. During the practice I froze up, but as the semester went on, I grew more confortable standing in front of the class. The difference between my persuasive speech and all my other speeches is that I was much more confident and comfortable with the delivery. It was a topic that I cared about and I was happy to share it with the class. In my delivery, I had eye contact with the audience, but I feel like I still glanced at the cards too much. I wanted it to be more conversational. What I liked about it was that I wasn’t moving around too much, which can be distracting or show a lack of confidence. I also didn’t use too many vocal fillers. With the feedback that the class gave me, it seems like I persuaded most of them and I think what I did that was successful was show the need for the research although I lacked pathos and ethos. Overall, I think most of the speeches were very persuasive due to the way that they presented the facts and their tone to show that they actually cared about the topic. What wasn’t successful was when they spoke too slowly or had too many vocal fillers. I feel like this takes away from the message they are trying to convey to the audience and persuade them about. I feel that this class has helped me to overcome most of my stage fright. I’m sure I would still get nervous with an unknown audience, but for the most part I have no problem giving a speech anymore. The most important thing I will take away from this class is that the audience is not there to judge or put you down you. In the end, they would have listened and the worst thing that could possibly happen would be that they don’t clap. Even if you make mistakes, they understand.

After both watching my persuasive speech video and previous videos, I’ve noticed that I’ve definitely changed in regards to both my physical and vocal delivery. I used to have terrible stage fright and would stutter while looking down at the ground whenever I had to present in front of the class, but this course has definitely helped me to get more comfortable with public speaking. Compared to how I presented before, I notice that I use less vocal fillers, make better eye contact, and seem a bit more confident. I think I did well in getting the audience’s attention during my speech through the visual aid, and by persuading them through examples and scenarios. After watching my classmate’s persuasive speeches, I think that the way you present yourself makes for a successful persuasive speech. If you look confident and assert your credibility while maintaining good posture, eye contact, and speak at an expressive and loud volume, you are definitely more likely to persuade your audience. When I go into business in the future, I will definitely use what I learn when presenting in business meetings. The most important skills I’ve taken from this class is speaking extemporaneously and speaking with more confidence. This course has definitely helped me a lot.

Watching the video of my persuasive speech showed me how much I have grown as a public speaker throughout the semester. I have a lot to work on, but I feel as though I am more comfortable speaking in front of others, and I know what I’m doing when I get up there.

I started off as an extremely timid public speaker, but I realize that my confidence has grown more and more each time I have given a speech. I figured this speech would be especially difficult to deliver, because I knew many people would disagree with my point of view. However, I was happy with the way I kept a cool head and wasn’t shaken up by some of the looks I received. Despite this, I realized that I rely on the index cards more than I thought I initially had. I think I could do a better job speaking extemporaneously, and may need to organize or practice a little more (Especially with visual aids.) Along with this, I noticed that I didn’t give many powerful hand gestures, which I usually do in my speeches. I think I did this to make sure my hands did not shake, and even further my nervousness, but I could definitely work on that. Lastly, I think I need to know my topic from top to bottom. That Q and A killed me, and pretty much killed my speech, which is why research is extremely important. Knowing you topic and being able to address counterarguments is a critical part of a speech, more specifically a persuasive one. Overall, I have become more comfortable as a speaker, and this class has given me the knowledge to build on and strive to be better.

After reviewing my videos over the past few months, I can be confident that my public speaking has gotten much stronger. The only flaw I have for my persuasive speech was that it sounded more like an informative speech, but overall my speech performance was alot stronger than when i initially came into the class. I have learned to keep a strong posture, use efficient hand gestures, and to keep a confident, strong voice to get my point across to the audience. In the beginning of the semester i struggled to keep a strong stance, i would constantly move around and I have trouble addressing all of the audience. However, now i have corrected these issues! I can definitely use this public speaking experience for my advantage in my future especially since my major is finance. It will be extremely useful in business meetings to get my point across to my other coworkers. The class was a great experience and I have taken alot from it!

• I believe that I have changed tremendously over this semester in terms of public speaking and speech giving.  When the semester started, my voice would tremble as soon as I got up in front of the class and usually I would sway from side to side throughout the duration of the entire speech. Now, my posture has improved, I do not sway from side to side, I usually maintain good eye contact throughout the whole presentation, and I am overall more confident. I believe that I was successful at winning over my audience with my persuasive speech because of the logic I used, the pathos, statistics, and expert/lay testimony. Also, on most of my peer critiques I received a 5 on the scale of how persuaded the listener was. In my opinion, good logic and good testimonies make a persuasive speech good. If the speaker is advocating for a logical argument and connects it to a person with lay/expert testimony, the speech will be persuasive and successful.  This class is probably the one in which I learned the most things that will actually help me in life. I plan to major in Marketing and hopefully one day, work for an Advertising Firm. The most important skills that I have learned for this class are how to be a confident public speaker, and the proper way to deliver a persuasive speech.

Right off the bat, I realized what you were talking about Julia. I do tend to end sentences off at a higher note and it makes me  sound less confident. I definitely need to work on that in the future. That’s something I did in my last speech, too. I feel like this time around, I used my index cards less. I spoke more extemporaneously. I had a stronger stance during this speech as opposed to older ones. I feel like my volume has been consistently fine throughout. My gestures have gotten better. I didn’t awkwardly hold my arm this time. I believe my speech was successful, but it probably persuaded more girls than guys. It directly affected the ladies in the room so they were probably much more persuaded by it. After watching everyone’s speeches, I noticed a few things. I liked to hear about more social issues as opposed to other ones. I liked learning about interesting thinks I had no idea about. Some speeches did not effect me at all because the speaker’s points and arguments seemed invalid to me. I had a strong stance on many of the topics from before, therefore I instantly agreed or disagreed. The skills I learned in this class will definitely help me in both the near and distant future. Here at Baruch, I know I’ll have to give many speeches, so I will definitely be using these skills. Later, as I graduate college and begin to work professionally, I know I’ll have to do a lot of public speaking. The most important skill I took away from this class was being able to speak confidently. Before, I used to be scared to give presentations and I would be nervous. I had to step out my comfort zone many times in this class and ultimately that ended up helping me.

Over the course, I have noticed that now I do use less vocal fillers now. I am also louder and I try to use more hand gestures now. My eye contact level has stayed the same, I think I was able to efficiently maintain eye contact with the audience. However, I still believe that I need to work on my stance. I still do a weird sway from side to side and I think this makes me look less confident. I think i was able to show emotions in my speeches and maintain volume and pitch throughout the course. Since this is a controversial speech, and I said many things to provoke the emotions of the audience, I believe that I was able to win over the audience.  I think a successful persuasive speech needs to use a little bit of everything so logos pathos and ethos. It should be straight to the point. It should be able to provoke the audience’s thought and emotions. I definitely think that I will be able to use these tactics in the future. I plan on going into the business field where you’ll definitely have to persuade your ideas to an audience at least one point in your career if not even more. The most important skills I have learned is to be able to really maintain eye contact which I never did. I also learned how to give off a more confident demeanor through your stance. Ive learned a lot of things from this class and i definitely will be using them in the future.

For the final posting, please respond to the following prompts.  Remember to include your name clearly in your post.

• After watching your persuasive speech video and reviewing your previous videos, what sort of changes do you notice in your physical and vocal delivery over the course of these speeches?
• How successful do you think your persuasive speech was at winning over your audience?  Why?
• Having watched your classmates’ persuasive speeches, what do you think makes for a successful persuasive speech?
• How can you see yourself using skills from this class in the near or distant future?  What do you consider to be the most important skills you’ve taken away from the class?

Upon viewing the group’s performance I believe we did a fairly good job. I think we individually presented our points well and had decent transitions. I think we could have
just added more content that related to our overall message earlier in the speech instead
of having to tie everything together at the end. That would have created a stronger point throughout the speech. I thought we used the visual aids pretty well, there was one instance where we skipped over a picture but other than that I really liked how the powerpoint came out and how everyone in the group used it. I thought I was a bit awkward
through the speech my voice sounds horrible and I thought it made the speech suffer. That being said I still think I did better than last time. My goals for the final speech is to improve my vocal delivery and open up more. In regards to everyone else’s presentations I think when their tones were of intrigue or had a such a flavorful vocal and physical delivery it’s hard not to pay attention. When people move too much and flail about I lose track as to what is the person is saying and all I can concentrate on is their movements. When people started too move much I really lost focus on what was being said.

Maahi Chowdhury

We worked pretty well organizing our information.  We did our body paragraphs separately .  However to put our paragraphs together we added transitions and did it together.  This way the speech flowed better from topic to topic.  To make it even better we could have added better transitions.  We didn’t have to use visual aid because the kind of art we used was sound.  We had a lot of audio clips so the audience can witness it first hand instead of hearing us talk about it for 20 minutes.  We could have had less text on the slides so when we  spoke it would come out more naturally.  This presentation was very different than the ones we did before.  Mostly because we had to rely greatly on outside information.  We had to memorize facts and details that weren’t our own which is hard because if you forget there is really no way to get that information during the speech.  My goal for this speech was mostly to not look at the screen when talking and to memorize my facts successfully.  During my speech however I feel like I could have spoken louder and more naturally to the audience.  For me to have been interested in the speech the speaker cant have been monotone.  Sometimes the information was repetitive which was annoying to sit through.  Over all I enjoyed doing the presentation.