T/Th Class 10/30 and 11/4

Like many of my students, I procrastinate all too often. (Especially on volunteer or un-assessed tasks.) Thus my notes about last week's class are late.

Informative Speeches - 10/30/2008

I can't name a Best Speech of the Day for this day because everyone did something well and no speech was perfect. I think the speech I personally enjoyed the most was Steve's presentation on the impact of microbrewery beer on Central Oregon. It was well organized and researched and had lots of local information. Steve also spoke with the energy and natural style that is common to speakers who pick topics on which they have a lot of interest.

Ryan offered good research in his speech on Cocaine and also spoke with energy. Megan also presented her information with a friendly style. Alma managed to get beyond her personal biases and present an object speech about the benefits and dangers of gambling. She also shared personal information with us that touched our hearts. Andrew faced the same challenge of possible bias in his speech about hybrid cars but managed to present pros and cons as well. Speaker 6 (who hasn't given permission to use a name) spoke with passion about a fun travel experience her family enjoyed. Jessica chose the fascinating topic of the Black Death and began and ended her speech with a nursery rhyme as her hook and clincher. This was a very artistic device. In his speech on the Chinese dragon, Rufio also had an artistic structure, motivating us in his introduction and conclusion by showing that China was the most populous nation (and the coming world leader) and suggesting that it would be helpful for us to know something about it's customs.

Informative Speeches - 11/4/2008

An historic election day that was totally ignored in our classroom!

Best Speech of the Day Honors are shared by Abby, MacKenzie, and Scott. All three gave speeches about subjects of interest to students in Central Oregon: piercing, caffeine and snowboarding, respectively. Abby's speech on piercing was well organized, interesting, and delivered with energy and a conversational style. Mackenzie wowed us with the number of sources she used and with her smile. Scott made the effort to dress up, bring his snowboard, and use his visual aids appropriate. Scott also taught us how to get rid of the automatic slide rotation on the latest version of PowerPoint. THANK YOU. I always appreciate students who teach me new aspects of technology.

Each of the other speeches also showed some particularyly appropriate quality. Rachael chose a topic that fascinates everyone - sex - and had lots of data to share. Alex had easy-to-see visuals of the army weaponry he discussed. Jason wore a shirt made out of hemp, the topic of his speech.

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.