My Public Speaking Experience

Outside of this class, the only experience I have with public speaking is mock trial. I was a lawyer on my team, and I delivered the opening statements at trials, which are essentially 5 minute speeches. From four years of mock trial and the civic artifact speech, I have learned some things about myself when it comes to public speaking.

Weaknesses: 

1. I am unsure of what to do with my body as I'm speaking. Often times when I stand up I feel myself making unnecessary hand gestures to make up for the fact that the rest of my body is not moving. Perhaps if I practiced my speeches standing up, I could also practice my movements that go along with it. I want my body language to make my speech more engaging.

2. I try to hard to have every word memorized, and I get tongue tied if I mess up. I could improve on this if I spent more time getting comfortable with the content of my speech instead of blindly memorizing. I need to allocate more time to practicing.

3. I am not a very loud person in life, so when I speak in public sometimes I forget to speak up. I need to have better, consistent, volume so what I'm saying is clear. This can be achieved if I just focus, and remind myself to have better volume before I go up.

Strengths:

1. I think I make good eye contact. I like to connect with the people I'm giving a speech to, and I know that I like when a speaker makes eye contact so it is something that I always try to do. I want to maintain this consistent eye contact to make my audience feel like I'm speaking to them, not at them. 

I know everyone battles with nerves, and for me nerves manifest themselves in a shaky voice. The first time I ever went up to give an opening statement in front of the "jury", my heart was in my throat and I was sure everyone could hear how nervous and shaky my voice was. But as time went on I realized that if I find a way to connect with the people I'm speaking to, I feel more at ease and I can more easily get past that heart-in-throat feeling. Whether it be through a reassuring/ friendly smile from the audience, or a short conversation with someone immediately beforehand (like a little icebreaker; I exchanged a few words with someone in the front row before my speech this semester and that helped me tremendously to feel more comfortable in front of everyone), feeling even a slight connection goes a long way for me.