Chpt 5 Developing Significant Topics Flashcards
Great Topic
Need time to research Topic with focus Think carefully about topic Spend time refining and narrowing the topic Plan to be effective
Thoughts on a topic
Focus on what you know and care about Take inventory of my personal concerns Relationship to community issues My intellectual and educational interests My career goals My leisure activities
Jumpstart my topic choice
List all my interests and identify matters of public concern that I am motivated to learn more
Decide what to talk about
Find topics of Public Concern
Reading papers Listening news Online news Issues on community, nation, world Form my own opinion and arguments
Great Speech
Takes a lot of work
Learn more about topic
Use research to support my knowledge, opinion, experience
Choosing a topic I’m interested in
Choose to gain more knowledge about the subject
Form your own opinion
Do research (newspaper, periodical, books)
Do your best work in preparation
Worthwhile presentation for your listeners
Identify possible Topics
Think about my interest and experiences
I will give a better speech if I care about the topic
Personal Inventory
Thoughtful look at what I really know and care about
Think about issues that affect me and my community
Inventory of my own intellectual and educational interests
My career goals
My leisure activities and interests
This helps me generate topics that are meaningful to me and audience
Personal Concerns and Community Issues
Begin my search for a topic by looking at issues and questions that are important to my community and me
Questions that start me thinking of a topic
What is going on in my life that bothers or concerns me
What is happening outside my world that is unfair, unjust, need of reform
Intellectual and educational Interests
Consider important topics that you would like to know more about
Ask following questions:-
-what do I like to read
-what interesting things have I learnt from TV, movies
-what courses, or issues covered in my courses have interested me?
Career Goals
What do I hope to do with my life
Leisure Activities and Interests
Things I do for fun, pleasure, enjoyment may be source of topics
be aware my topics may not be substantial important to audience
Starting point for topic search
Intellectual and educational interest Career goals Personal Concerns Social concerns Favorite leisure activities
Steps to narrow topics
Consider situation
Consider audience
Steps to narrow Topic
Choose topic Refine my topic by: -consider how situation will influence my speech time constraints audience
Fine tune preliminary my topic
Refine purpose conduct research develop arguments supporting material organize ideas
Fine tune steps
consider audience
decide precisely what I hope to accomplish
consider situation
Consider Situation
Does topic relate to recent events of concern to my listeners
Would I be able to convince my listeners to care as much about my topic
Do I have time to cover topic well
Consider Audience
- what does audience already know
- what common experiences with audience
- how diverse is audience
Ethical Consideration in selecting a topci
commit to becoming knowledgeable about the topic thru careful research behavioral standards don't make up information don't distort statistics don't misquote material
Ethical Consideration to adhere to
Accuracy
Fairmindedness
good taste
sound judgment
Accuracy
don’t mis inform, mislead, harm
speaker responsibility to research carefully
know what you are talking about and believe in what you are saying
learn more about topic
cite a variety of reputable sources
makes you more credible and is part of ethical consideration
Objectivity
Audience perception of a speaker’s honesty or fair-mindedness in considering diverse points of view
Subjective
based on experience values we learn religious feeling political biases expectations for social behavior preexisting opinion, biases or feelings
Fairmindedness
open to research findings
willing to modify opinion based on research results
don’t challenge or avoid info that is against existing opinion
Strong well reasoned stand on an issue
thoroughly researched your topic
come to a thoughtful conclusion
Purposeful speech
speaker aims to get responses from listeners
Speeches and their purpose
response from audience is understanding with informative speech
persuasive speech= influence the way listeners feel, what they believe, how they act
ceremonial speech= reinforce values and build community unity
Formulate general and specific purpose
contemplate situation
evaluate own interests
consider audience interests
Determine purpose
consider response you want from audience
eg. you want audience to understand
or you want audience to change their mind or act
as you refine topic, you translate it into specific statement of audience response you want
3 General Purpose
Informative purpose
Persuasive purpose
Ceremonial purpose
Persuasion
More than just telling what to do or believe
More than giving facts or statistics
More than simply stating opinion
More than asking, recommending, demanding
Give the audience good reasons for accepting our claims
Listeners feel strongly about an issue, agree with you, take some definitive action
Ceremonial Purpose
Community building
Honor someone, celebrate an event of shared significance
pay tribute to someone we have loved or lost
ceremonial speaking uplifts us, comforts us and reinforces our sense of community with others
Articulate and reinforce shared values
Ask following questions:-
- what brought us together
- what defines us as a community
- which of our accomplishments gives us most pride
- what are the principles we cherish
- honor our heroes, praise their accomplishments
- present an award, honor graduates, motivate listeners to serve their communitites
Offer encouragement and inspiration to our listeners
- hard work, determination, desire to succeed will pay off
Reaffirm and strengthen the shared values that define our communities and cultures
marking a special occasion
paying tribute to an important person in my life
Test specific purpose statement
make sure it aims for specific response from audience
reflects the realities of the situation
is clear and ethical
Specific purpose statement
describes response you want from audience shaped by:- goals of speaker situation you speak in potential benefit to audience recent events demands of the situation
Specific purpose statement
ultimate response the speaker hopes to achieve
crafting the specific purpose statement carefully is vital in clearly focusing the speech
Test specific purpose statement
calls for audience response
realistic (time for speech, how motivated are listeners, setting impact on outcome of speech)
clear (state what audience should believe or do)
ethical (avoid conflict of interest)
choose topic for best interest of audience
Thesis statement
grows from my specific purpose statement embodies main idea of speech focused without details my speech in a nutshell the heart of my speech helps me focus my research and plan my speech
Construct a Thesis statement
-single sentence declarative (not question)
embodies idea
accomplish specific purpose
helps listeners understand, feel, believe
-clear and specific without details
all the ideas in one thought
-focused and limited in scope
Avoid common thesis mistakes
don't write as question or topical phrase not a preview of speech not complex and hard to follow not excessively detailed not too many ideas
