CH 12: Delivering Your Speech

Chapter 12 goes into great detail about what entails a great speech and things you'll need to complete "perfection". In fact, at the beginning of the powerpoint it tells us how practice makes perfect. As much as I know this is used amongst certain individuals to promote practice in harnessing your craft, I often remind my students and young athletes I train that there is no such thing as perfect. And that practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent. How you practice is how you'll play....a common saying amongst athletes in sports. 

    Using the two p's will provide stability throughout your speech and give you the confidence you need when delivering your speech. Going into a speech blind is absolutely the last thing you want to do! Speaking from personal experience, I went into a best man's speech going off of the tip of my tongue and spoke for a period of time far too long than what was expected! Whether you memorize or use a manuscript, using the two p's will tremendously help in delivering a speech and ensuring you capture your audiences attention.

Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is a process I've had to use in my life growing up an athlete, playing various sports, and utilizing this process to provide advantages over opponents. However, when discussing critical thinking and assessing a speaker, I've never really given it as much thought as the PowerPoint breaks down. For me, I'm always far more concerned with the questions I raise in my head when I'm delivering a speech rather than what questions I should be asking when I'm listening to a speech. Generally speaking, I think when it's personal, and relating to yourself, you're far more concerned with the outcome than using your ears and paying attention to what is said when your listening to a speaker. As we continue on with the course and listen to each other's stories, using the questions from the slides I will try to dissect more information given and pay close attention to the details following the story.  

CH 9 Takeaway

     When it comes to public speaking, gaining your audiences attention is key in delivering a good speech. As discussed in Chapter 9, the text stresses the importance of grasping your audience's attention and pulling them in. On page 9-2 Hellmut Walters states, "To be persuasive, we must be believable. To be believable, we must be credible. To be credible, we must be truthful." Walters hits the nail on the head with this quote from the book. If I'm delivering a persuasive speech, with hopes of you buying into what I'm trying to say, if I'm not believable I'll lose my audience, which, in turn, will then lead to the loss of my credibility. Gaining the audience's attention is one of the biggest factors I focus on when delivering a speech. When I begin to notice eye contact and the look of being alert, it puts my mind at ease letting me know that I've drawn my audience in and they're interested in what I have to say. 

    To feel confident when giving a speech in public, I enjoy telling a story or recalling on a certain occasion to give myself that feeling of credibility. Relating back to a past experience allows me the certainty of speaking clearly and with truth behind my tone of voice. I look forward to expanding on my public speaking skills over the course of the class and hearing each and everyone's own story from week to week.

Zoom Call Takeaway

     Going back to last week and recapping our zoom call, I enjoyed the conversation and the introduction to what we'll be doing over the course of the class. Public speaking has never been enjoyable for me, yet I'm not one to really sit back and keep quiet. Coming from the world of sales prior to jumping ship and changing careers, I relied heavily on my social skills as well as my ability to conduct face to face meetings and present business models to small and mid-sized business owners. I can definitely say that picking up the phone and making 100 dials a day, or sitting down for a face to face meeting has greatly improved my public speaking skills and it's helped tremendously. 

    During our zoom call, we touched on being uncomfortable and speaking in public with others. Going off the small class size that we have, I hope we all can relax a little bit, be ourselves and listen to the stories that are told. Having a small class definitely makes for a "less intense" moment yet I still find some awkwardness during a zoom call lol. There's something about the process that just seems a little off to me but overall it gets the job done!

Chapters 12, 14 & 15

     While looking through the required resources, ten rules for writing multiple choice test items immediately caught my eye solely for the fact that I always looked forward to multiple choice tests/quizzes. Of the ten rules listed, two had really stuck out to me. One was to keep all answer choices same length and the other was to mix up the order of the correct answers. As a student I can remember that these were the little queues I would try and pick up on to give myself an advantage. I always applied process of elimination when doing multiple choice to help establish which answers could possibly fit, and which answers were completely off. As I would apply this to my tests I picked up on short answers and lengthy answers and would use process of elimination to help myself come to the appropriate answer. As a future teacher I don't plan on throwing too many curveballs at my students, however I will do my best to keep each answer around the same length and keep it consistent.
     After reading Chapter 12, I really enjoyed  learning about motivation in learning, goals, self-determination and self worth. In school and in life in general, having self-determination goes a long way in helping you get over that hump and reach your goals. As a student in high school, I didn't have much self-determination to reach goals academically. My mindset was to do what I needed to do to only pass the class. I didn't shoot for an A, or A-, or a B. I didn't narrow the scope. I left my goal sitting on a broad table and would tell myself just do what you need to do to pass. If I could go back in time I would change my own mindset in a heartbeat. As a grew older I was able to create this self-determination for academics and thinking back on it, the mindset has become calloused when setting personal goals. Aside from self-determination I also believe having self-worth is very important as well. Speaking as a coach and when talking to my athletes prior to going into a big game being considered the underdog, I like to remind my kids of letting them know who they represent and how we play. I attempt to build their self worth to mentally give them a fighting chance even though on paper we might not be as good as our competition. This translates to the classroom when learning new material. Student's need to know that they can achieve almost anything when setting their mind to it and to not discredit themselves based on past grades or what someone else might say.
     Chapter 14 goes into discussing effective teaching, planning, different approaches and adaptive teaching. Taking different approaches in the classroom with your students hit home with me as I couldn't agree more that we all learn differently. Many individuals can open a book, read the material, be engaged and retain the information that was covered. Speaking for myself this hasn't always been the case. If the topic really catches my interest, than of course I'm engaged and enjoying what I'm reading, however, I've always thoroughly enjoyed watching a film, or video clip to absorb information than open a book and read the material being covered. As a future teacher I will use apply as many different approaches as necessary to create that engagement the student needs to learn and retain material being covered. Also covered in Chapter 14 that I enjoyed looking over was Rosenshine's six teaching functions: 1. Review and check the previous days work 2. Present new material 3. Provide guided practice 4. Give feedback and correctives based on student answers 5. Provide independent practice 6. Review weekly and monthly to consolidate learning. It explains that these steps aren't to be followed in order but are elements of effective instruction. As a future teacher I can say that I plan on utilizing these six steps and they're all very important in being an effective teacher.
     In Chapter 15, Woolfolk discuses classroom assessment, grading and standardized testing. One of the biggest things that stood out to me in this chapter was confidence interval. It states to never base an opinion on a students ability or achievement on the exact score a student obtains. When it comes to myself I know that my test scores DO NOT reflect upon my overall intelligence. I've always thought of myself as more of a street smart individual than a school smart, yet I know to never cut myself short of others just because of a bad grade. You win some and you lose some, that's life. You're gonna have a great scores, good scores and poor scores. Even though that number might represent a letter grade it is by no means a way for you or someone else to classify you for what you received. Teachers understand that some of us aren't good test takers due to whatever the reasons may be, however as a future teacher I will never look down upon, or criticize a student for receiving a poor grade. I've received my fair share of bad grades in school but cant say I've ever had a teacher judge my intelligence based on a test of quiz. There is more to the lesson applied than a final grade.

Chapters 9,10 & 11

     In chapter 9, I enjoyed reading about metacognition (thinking about thinking) and the different learning strategies. There are three essential metacognitive skills; planning, monitoring and evaluating. Planning involves giving a specific task a time frame. Looking back on my past I was always very efficient with my time and would plan ahead knowing how much time I had to complete whatever I was doing. I was very orderly at a child. Monitoring is having real time awareness. Asking yourself things such as does this make sense? Or am I trying to go to fast? As a child I was always a fast reader and felt proud of my ability to read at a fast rate. Over time I learned this was negatively effecting me as I wasn't retaining as much information. The more I would allow myself to slow down and comprehend what I was reading enabled me to absorb more information than if I read really fast. Evaluating involves making judgments about the process and outcomes of thinking and learning. Questions such as should I get help? And give up for now? Relating back to me being a fast reader and not comprehending the material read, I often found myself asking these questions over and over again. I have nothing against putting something aside momentarily and coming back to it with a fresh mindset, but to give up is never an option. Thinking about the times I struggled in school I wish I asked more questions and sought help when needed.
     Another section in Chapter 9 I really enjoyed was reading about the different types of learning strategies. There are many different strategies to approach when learning new material and each and every one of us learns differently. One strategy that works best for a particular student might not work best with another. We all learn in our own ways and as future teachers it is our responsibility to shed light on all strategies and find which best suites each individual student. Underlining, highlighting and taking notes went a long way with myself when it came to studying and retaining information. Notes seem to be the norm for students when trying to organize important ideas from the lesson being taught. Taking that a step farther and underlining, or highlighting certain key words worked exceptionally well with me. It allowed me to use visualization by focusing on those key highlighted or underlined words and I was able to retain that information much longer.
     Chapter 10 discusses social and cognitive constructivism, designing constructivist learning environments, and collaboration and cooperation. One constructivist view of learning states "social interactions are important in this knowledge construction process (Bruning, Schraw, & Norby, 2011; Schunk, 2016). Vygotsky emphasized this idea stating that social interaction, cultural tools and activity help shape individual development. Personally speaking, I strongly agree with social interaction aiding in a child's learning development. I feel as if it creates comfort amongst students and also allows them to develop skills they'll need for later in life. As a future teacher I will definitely implement group activities with the students as well as individual work.
     Lastly, Chapter 11 discusses social cognitive views of learning,motivation, self-efficacy and self-regulated learning. Self regulation is the process of activating and sustaining thoughts, behaviors, and emotions in order to reach goals. When those goals involve learning we discuss self-regulated learning. Self-regulated learners have combined skills of self-awareness, academic learning skills and motivation. To help influence self-regulated learning students must have knowledge and motivation. What I enjoyed reading about was the teacher stress dealt with self-regulated learning. During a teachers first few years it can become stressful to the point of burnout if we don't learn to develop coping strategies to handle the extreme pressures. As a future teacher I understand that I will have to develop coping strategies to deal with the stress that comes with the job. I'm a fairly laid back individual and don't have much stress in my life, so I know when my time comes as a teacher I will need to develop a plan to help keep me mentally strong.
   

Chapters 4,5, 6 & 8

     At the beginning of Chapter 4, I enjoyed how they jumped right into examining the practice of labeling individuals based on differences such as intelligence ad disability. As explained, a label doesn't explain which methods to use with students. Student's in high school who are labeled as " learning disabled" are often put into courses with less demand than those in your traditional academic courses. I don't necessarily find this right as some students may only lack in certain areas of education and now don't reap the same opportunity as other students. It takes away from the level of teaching in other areas that the student might excel in. As they go into discussing how being labeled may protect the student by creating a stronger understanding from other students and become more patient, or supportive, I can see how that may help over time yet I want all students to have equal opportunity to be the best they can be.
     On page 123 in figure 4.1, it displays disability etiquette when speaking to an individual with special needs. In the first picture it shows a parental figure speaking about Paul to his mother as if he wasn't there to answer the question for himself. In the second picture displayed it shows the parent speaking directly to Paul, allowing him to answer his own questions making him feel apart of the conversation. Although I do not work with students who may have a disability, when speaking with a child when his parent is present, I will speak directly to the child first to observe his body language and hear his thoughts on the question. If necessary, I follow up with the parent to make sure everything is accurate but I always try to keep them involved and not let them think they're not there. I want them to be apart of the process and gain understanding as to what we are trying to accomplish.
     In Chapter 5 I really enjoyed reading about the language development and balanced bilinguals. I have a year and a half old niece who I see often and enjoy watching her development grow. When she's into a new toy, or watching one of her favorite TV shows (Baby Shark), it's incredible to see how much she focuses and what she does while watching. You can definitely see the wheels spinning! In regards to language, she doesn't have a full vocabulary however she is able to pick up certain words and speak them with decent pronunciation. As she grows older I look forward to using this information learned about language development and really pay attention to her growth!
     On pg.187 when discussing dual language development, it states that if they are exposed to two languages from birth, bilingual children reach the same language milestone at the same rate as monolingual children. This is extremely impressive and I'm a huge fan of those who can speak more than one language. Growing up I've had friends who were raised and exposed to two languages over the course of the lives. Interesting enough as it is, not all of them can still speak both languages. Implementing the use of a second language in school helps, yet I learned from others how using that language in the home setting is just as important as in school. I've had a close friend tell me how if it wasn't for using his Spanish at home with his family, he doesn't believe he would be as efficient in the language as he is today. As a future teacher and having bilingual students in my classroom, I would encourage them to not lose their native language and let them know we care by using their language allowing them to feel wanted.
     Culture and diversity can be two major factors with learning and teaching. As we know, different cultures and have different beliefs and values that we all must respect. In Chapter 6 In figure 6.1 on pg. 219, culture is compared to an iceberg. It says one-third of the iceberg is only visible, the rest is hidden and often unknown. As a future teacher I will understand that there is always more to the visible eye. I will use this approach to allow myself to understand the student on a deeper level, let him know I care about his values and beliefs to build a strong, trusting relationship with the student.
     As I mentioned before, I want all students to have equal opportunity to be the best they can be. On the bottom of pg. 242 it goes into discussing gender bias in teaching and how with the study done(focused more on white students) teachers are more involved with male students. I'm not currently a teacher so I can't say I've personally seen this first hand, however, I feel there are quite a few factors that can play into this. The book states how this includes more negative interactions than positive interactions. I would say its more common for a male to "act out" than a female, which results in those negative interactions yet I understand this may not always be the case. When my time comes as a teacher I will create fairness and treat each student the same allowing them to feel equal to one another.
     On pg. 304 in Chapter 8, I was very into the sensory memory and how we use things around us such as sight, vision, taste and feel to form perceptions and bank memories. Dew in the morning is one that strikes me very much. Some individuals might think it must have rained; when I smell dew in the morning I immediately am drawn back to my days on the diamond, playing those early morning games waiting for the grass to dry. It's very interesting how we each perceive different senses and which ones resonate with us more than others. I would encourage my students to use their experiences as they grow and further their education.