Instructions for your Presentational Speaking Blogging Assignment

This is the course blog for our Presentational Speaking class. As part of your participation in this class, you will be expected to actively contribute course material to this blog.

You will be required to locate 4 video clips of public speeches or presentations that illustrate key course concepts, upload them to the course blog, and analyze them by discussing the public speaking concepts you think they illustrate. Your analysis should pertain to the most recent course material covered. Please refer to the syllabus for due dates.

The Assignment:

1. Start your post with an appropriate title that tells us what concept the speech illustrates.


2. If possible, embed the video. If not possible, link to it. You need to choose one of these methods in order to receive credit for your post.


3. Briefly describe the speech/presentation (who’s the speaker, when & where was the speech given, why was it given). You don’t need to spend more than 2-3 sentences on this part.


4. Identify the course concept the speech illustrates and explain why you believe your example is a good illustration of that concept. The point of the analysis is to show that you understand key course concepts and that you can apply them to real life examples. When you apply a course concept, point to specific parts of the speech by:

• referring to time cues [i.e. By explaining his educational background, the speaker introduces a strong ethos appeal (1:36)]

• or by briefly describing the scene or speech segment [i.e. When the speaker starts discussing the second slide, she introduces a red herring fallacy…]


5. Evaluate the effectiveness of the course concept and provide suggestions for
   improvement. In other words, make an argument that the speaker employed these concepts well or poorly, back up your position, and explain what he/she could have done better.
   

I have linked to a great example in one of my prior bog posts.