Giving a Speech!

Great news! I've been invited to give a speech at George Jackson Academy in the fall (and to attend their first ever graduation next Monday). I wrote about GJA in a previous post and for the past few months I've really been in awe of what they do and how they have so many motivated young men at the school.

In honor of the news, I wanted to touch on public speaking. Many people are afraid of public speaking but there are ways to overcome the fear. There are groups such as Toastmasters (which actually has over 200,000 members). Public speaking is a critical skill and I highly encourage anyone afraid of public speaking/presentations to get assistance from Toastmasters or from one of College Knowledge's mentors. For free advice, I think this is a pretty good document they provide with 10 tips for successful public speaking.

For me, public speaking is actually fun. I make sure to know my material, practice it beforehand, but also stay loose. You should provide an initial benefit statement after the hook in the beginning of your presentation/speech. You should also be interacting with the crowd as you go along and sometimes you even need to improvise. Most importantly, for public speaking to become fun for you requires practicing it a lot until it becomes second nature!