Today's Speeches 10/29/08

I liked the way the impromptu speakers in my class today just got up and started talking right away. They didn't take the 30 seconds prep time. They had great energy. I especially enjoyed Brian's little speech about "If you don't like people, go to internet chatrooms."

Some good work was accomplished with the informative speeches. Tylor was the most relaxed and energetic with his presentation about the engineering of golf balls. Zach showed that he was an impassioned expert as he talked about the iron man event. He also adapted well to the experience of time being shorter than he expected. Veronica offered some very sad stories in her speech on sweat shops yet managed to avoid trying to persuade us to do anything about them. Jenna was the best in referencing her researched sources.

Best Work in Speech on 10/28/2008

I got permission from some members of my Tuesday/Thursday class to use their real names when I talk about what people did especially well.

First of all, Best-Speech-Of-The-Day Award goes to Acacia for her speech about two Japanese Festivals. She chose to focus on festivals that would interest a young college audience, she refered clearly to her sources and also had references for her borrowed PowerPoint visuals, and her speech was appropriately organized. She also smiled, made eye contact, and sounded interested and enthusiastic about her topic. Very nice work.

I also appreciated Leandra's ability to link dance and sports in a way that could give non-dancers a better understanding of the art. Melany's interesting story of the Winchester Mystery House and its ghosts was well adapted to the Halloween season and Calvin's costume, with his Nosler hat and Cabela's shirt, was very appropriate for a speech on re-loading.

The impromptus also went well with props going to Ryan for his archaic oratory and perfect comic timing and to Megan for her calm ability to adapt to being unexpectedly called on as well as an excellent conclusion.

Impromptu Speaking

Ah. It's always interesting to snap a picture of a class personality by responding to the impromptu topic they give me. I enjoy demonstrating impromptu speaking because I used to compete in it in high school.

How it works -- Here are the directions for the assignment

Impromptu Speaking
Time: 1-2 minutes
This is a speech given with little preparation: 30 seconds
No rubrics for this one!
To receive a “pass,” your impromptu must
• be at least one minute long
• have an introduction, body and conclusion
• no pauses over 4 seconds • NO BABBLING.

I have students make up topics that go into an envelope. Then I have those who want to do so make up a "Huck Challenge Topic" for me. I appoint an assistant who collects these topics then I leave the room. The assistant is supposed to read the topics aloud to the class and the class chooses. I have never been defeated -- although at times I've done what I permit students to do for this assignment: "Lie like a rug."

This quarter, my Monday/Wednesday class chose "The History of Hair Dye." A nice, friendly topic. On the other hand, my Tuesday/Thursday class, those characters, picked "Explain the Impact of Anal Sex on the Youth of Today." Wow. That caused me a moment's pause. I always worry that if my impromptu speaking assignment has a sexual quality a student will complain to the authorities even if they are the ones who invited my speaking about the topic. But I decided to go for it and gave a serious presentation. I am, after all, a sex educator as well as a communication professional! I used the speech as an opportunity to plug my spring class, "Communicating Love."

Getting good grades

When I was in school it was often important for me to get good grades. I remember that Dad gave me a dollar for each quarter's A when I was in grade school. But I was really a B+/A- student. Through high school and my undergraduate years I never worked hard enough to get all As unless I wanted to impress the teacher of the class. In math and science I struggled just to get Cs. Actually, due to a brief window of opportunity regarding math I was able to avoid math entirely in college.

All this is preface to an interesting experience I've had this year. I have students in my speech classes who are choosing not to do the work even though they remain in class. Now this is something I don't understand. Why would someone just not do an assignment? Especially when all the directions are given and all one needs to do is follow the directions? I can only assume that these students are content to get low scores. I try my best to make sure everything is absolutely clear in class and every direction is written down. I ask for questions. I respond within two to 20 hours to every email.

Perhaps they are having an experience similar to mine after I was busted at age 19. As I was waiting for my case to come up before a judge in Alameda county in 1972, I entered a community college that we called UCLA -- University of Campbell at Latimer Avenue or Waste Valley. I decided that semester that I would reform myself and turn away from bad behavior and commit to something I could make money with -- business classes. So I took shorthand, accounting, business methods, and, for fun, music. I wound up dropping each of the classes and eventually just flunking music because I really had no interest in any of the courses.

Maybe my speech students are the same. All they want is a class and because they don't care about the material they aren't doing the work. I can respect that. Why do work if you don't care? And so far none of them have complained about their low grades. So, really, I guess it's not a problem. Their choices WOULD be a problem if they gave a few balls of deer excrement what their grade was going to be.

Tuesday Thursday Mistakes

I seem to make more mistakes in my T Th class this quarter than in my MW. The first week I managed to have a streak of white face cream on my jaw line that one student mentioned at the end of class. I also have enjoyed misspellings on the white-board and had trouble with the overhead projector just before a lecture on visual aids. I've told them that they distract me. The tone of the group is lively (which is much better than overly quiet). They chit chat a lot during breaks between speeches. Every once in a while when my back is turned they laugh and I feel like I must have a "kick me" sign. They aren't mean spirited just active.

I do enjoy them. Most of them went to the trouble of constructing their visual aids for SA#2. There was one young man who had a posterboard with brass tone tacks through each of the letters of the label and his three pie charts. It made for an attractive display.

I want to start writing about specific students but don't want to use real names. I'm going to figure out the easiest way to work that before informative speeches start.

Reasons for Class Absence

This has never happened to me before! A young woman just called to explain that her boyfriend is in my morning class and that she had made a bad mistake with the alarm clock and he was late this morning because she'd set it for 7 p.m. rather than 7 a.m. What a nice girlfriend! Caring and considerate of her man.

I explained our class attendance policy (he needs to explain to the class why he didn't attend and the class votes) and said he'd make up the missed speaking activity on Monday.

Readers and Preparation

So, two students have actually admitted to reading some of my blog! One, a member of my weekend class, told me on Sunday that I hadn't written about them yet so I wrote something that a member of my MW class also read. My MW student said, "You love your weekend class" and then told me that he'd been bored so he found and read my blog.

I talked about my weekend class this morning. For Speaking Assignment #2, the "main point, research, visual aid" assignment, I noticed an interesting difference between the MW class and the weekend bootcamp. A majority of the MW class used the whiteboard and didn't prepare a visual aid on paper or the computer while only one of my weekend students had relied on the whiteboard. So I asked the students this morning why it was when they had so much more time they didn't take that time to make visual aids.

One young man said that it was because he was counting on the spontaneity of the moment to be able to write a class response to the question on the board. I believed him because he actually used the live audience well. A young woman said that if she was actually giving a full speech she would have gone to the trouble but wanted the experience of the spontaneous use of the whiteboard. Another student admitted that she had a paper due in another class that she'd given her time to and one admitted that having so much time actually cut down on preparation because it became easy to procrastinate. One student also noted that the weekend class had nothing else to do that weekend but take my class so they could focus. Now, that may or may not have been true.

I like this assignment because it's interesting to me to hear their stories about cheating.

Public Speaking Bootcamp

It's lunch on Sunday of the first weekend of my public speaking bootcamp. This is a hard core, hard working class. All of the course is taught on two weekends and students have to be highly self-motivated to survive. Actually, the main concepts of the course are taught on the first weekend and the students have three weeks to write three speeches which they will give on the three days of the second weekend. The course is emotionally and physically exhausting but it's an excellent way of learning the basic skills of public speaking. Students tend to bond closely and the intensity of the class helps write what they are supposed to be learning into their neurons.

Yesterday they did their introductions and their impromptus. One of the most interesting comments about speech anxiety was made by a student who actually had the best delivery. She said that she didn't remember what she said. But she looked so calm -- had good eye contact, a strong natural vocal style, and natural gestures. While the rest of the class had a few problems with their delivery, overall I was very happy with the performances. Almost every person got the concept of a clear thesis statement (core outcome of the first assignment) and they all passed the impromptu. They are an energetic bunch. It's students like these who make this course manageable for me. They give back a lot and that keeps me upright. I was dreading this weekend but it's turned out to be a lot of fun.

FACT CHECKING

Well, turned out they BOTH lied last night. See Calvin Woodward of Associated Press here

The home of fact-checking is here at FactCheck.org

For other interesting reading about the debate, there's wonderful live blog by Rick Klein of ABC. I love his comment: "9:23 pm CT: Maverick, maverick. Maverick. Maverick maverick maverick."

Well, there's so much out there for political junkies. For a quick overview go to USNews and World Report.

As for me, if I were still a graduate student in speech communication (and I gave a rodent's derriere) I'd do a close analysis myself but frankly, I got bored after about 45 minutes with the stump speaking and standardized responses.

Watching the VP Debate

Gwen Ifill of Washington Week is a terrific moderator -- calm, intelligent, and not pompous like some.

Watching the debate --

I am already being driven CRAZY! First question goes utterly unanswered by Joe Biden who runs off into an attack on Bush and a standard issue blah blah blah about Obama. Then Sarah natters on about John McCain. Neither answer the moderator's question about "Was this the best or worst of Washington."

So far, they both sound like people prepped to spout their stump drivel.

Yes...the moderator noticed and SAID that neither of them answered the question "What would you do as vice president."

Ah. The republican is calling for "strict oversight" of Wall Street. Hmmmm.

But they do both look good in their black suits.

They are both using the standard advertising technique of repeating the name of the front of the ticket...though for some reason Biden is repeating John McCain's name a lot.

Ah. Biden smiles at Sarah's claim about voting for biggest tax bump. Big Joe smile. Then he seems to remember that he's not supposed to smile.

The point about McCain supporting deregulation that is made by Joe is a good one.

Moderator says, "Why is this not class warfare?" taxing over $250 thousand. Joe says it's fairness. The wealthy should pay more.

The naming of things. I do like Joe Biden's discussion of the label given to taxing corporations more: he says fairness, Sarah says "redistribution of wealth."

Biden cheap shot -- "Ultimate bridge to nowhere" put an annoying twist on a thoughtful attack on McCain's $5000 for healthcare idea.

What did Sarah do with the oil companies? This is something I'd want to more about. Ah...Joe says the she supported a windfall profits tax on the oil companies...so he's saying he hopes she can get McCain to support her way of doing things.

OK....once again, she's not responding to the question about McCain's position on banking...now she's going off into energy. She's arguing energy independence.

Sarah keeps has reversed causal relationships twice. Main street and wall street switch and a man/climate switch. It's just a speaking thing but still...a bit unusual for a public speaker her age and her level.

Joe loves the data about McCain voting 20 times against funding alternative forms of energy.

She says she is tolerant. Hmmm. Palin is saying she agrees that there should be no civil rights distinction for gay couples. Though she hedges a bit. And neither Biden nor Palin believes in gay marriage.

"Your plan was a white flag of surrender." Big attack by Palin. She emphasizes that we must win. Victory within sight. Now Biden is saying that he gave the warning. John McCain "has been dead wrong on the fundamental issues."

Palin sounding much more intelligent than expected after her bad Katie Couric interview. Hmmm. Palin calls for a two-state system. Biden doesn't support a two-state issue.

Sarah is being very good about showing respect to Joe.

They are wacking each other pretty well. I think Joe is winning in the use of data and facts and Sarah is winning in the presentation of self as ordinary American tough in the face of Washington chicanery and a nasty world..