Suppose that you were preparing a how-to speech on the topic of painting miniature figures. It’s your favor-ite hobby, so you already know a good deal about how it’s done. You’ve also read several books and magazine articles on the topic and taken notes as you’ve gone along.
Now it’s time to categorize those notes. Notice in my example that I’ve categorized each note as “paint selection,” “brush work,” and so forth, written beneath the page numbers in the left margin. This step is done when you’re ready to start an outline, not during the actual research process—unless you know in advance
exactly what you’ll be discussing in your speech. Most of the time, however, you’ll find it most valuable to finish all your research before trying to categorize the information.
The categories are very important for two rea-sons: They enable you to decide what points you want to discuss in your speech, and they make it easy to find information on each point as you begin your outline.
So you read through your notes and decide that you want to talk specifically about various ways to use a paintbrush, different uses for different types of paint, and how to paint various types of material that a min-iature figure is made from. Here is what your initial outline will look like:
I. Introduction TBD A.
II. Ways to use a paintbrush
smooth strokes are best (Smith 22) A.
but sometimes rough strokes add texture B.
(Jones 43)
[need more info on various strokes from C.
Smith]
III. How to select paint
“lifeblood” quote from Smith 36 A.
importance of primer (Smith 12; Jones 29;
B.
Brown 44)
why paints are different—summarize Smith C.
38–43
IV. Different modeling materials metal (Jones 128–132) outline. First, it is pretty sparse! This is an important feature of outlining: You are not actually writing the speech, you’re just organizing your thoughts. So for now all you need is a short statement that will direct your thinking and writing in the next phase of the
–PreParing an outline–
writing process. Remember that an outline is just a skeleton; you’ll add flesh and muscle when you actually start writing.
You will also notice that the outline draws together your research information from all the sources you’ve consulted and organizes the information into a logical structure. This is where the categorization of your notes becomes so helpful, because you can scan through many pages of notes looking specifically for information on a particular point, ignoring all the rest that does not apply.
Finally, you’ll notice that there is some informa-tion missing. When you were doing your research, you didn’t think that Smith’s information on various brush strokes would be pertinent to your speech—
but now you think differently. Aren’t you overjoyed that you wrote down where to find that information?
Now you can quickly return to Smith’s book and find the specifics you need to fill out that portion of your outline.
conclusion
You might note that this lesson is constructed using the very pattern that we’re discussing. It begins with an introduction, then goes into detail in the body, and here we are at the conclusion!
The main points you need to remember from this lesson are these: You must have an outline before you begin writing, or you won’t know where you’re going and how you’ll get there; your outline will only be as good as your research notes, so learn to take notes efficiently; the outline is just a skeleton, provid-ing short directions that you’ll use when actually writprovid-ing the speech.
Now it’s time for you to put these theories into practice.
Exercise
Use this basic structure as a starting point to create an outline from your research notes:
I. Introduction
Who am I? Why am I speaking?
A.
What will I speak about?
B.
What will the audience learn or gain from C.
my presentation? Or what opinion do I intend to prove?
II. Point 1: The first step, piece of evidence, or impor-tant fact
Details on this point A.
Examples of this point B.
Why this point is important to the overall C.
Why this point is important to the overall C.
Why this point is important to the overall C.
topic V. Conclusion
Summarize the main points A.
Summarize how the points taught the skill, B.
proved the thesis, or demonstrated the facts Draw a conclusion that is applicable to your C.
audience
–PreParing an outline–
n your outline is just a skeleton, showing you the basic structure of your speech. you’ll add flesh and muscle in the actual writing process.
n your outline is only as good as your notes. take good notes, and you’ll write a good outline.
n Remember this rule when taking notes: When in doubt, don’t leave it out!
n Be careful to include full citation information, including page numbers, when taking notes, so that you can find information later.
n if you aim at nothing, you’ll hit it every time!
tips
PreParing an outline
–PreParing an outline–
leSSon
n
ow that we have constructed a skeleton for our speech, we are ready to add some muscle and flesh to the bones. This is where the majority of the writing work takes place, so it makes the most sense to start here.You may not be delivering your speech by reading from a fully written text; in fact, most of the time you won’t want to. (We’ll discuss this further in Lesson 10.) Nevertheless, it will be a very helpful exercise to write out your first speech word-for-word, exactly as you will deliver it. This will help you to understand a number of fundamental principles involved in good speech writing. In this lesson, we will address the most important part of your speech: the body.
As we discussed in Lesson 5, there are many types of speeches that you might find yourself asked to give, but all of them follow more or less the same pattern when constructing the body. Therefore, we will tackle the
LESSON SUMMARY
The body of your speech contains the living organs, or the facts and information that define what you have to say. In this lesson, you will learn how to build that body.
Speech is the mirror of the soul; as a man speaks, so is he.
—Publilius Syrus, First Century b.c.
bodY
building
7
–bodY building–
most challenging form of speech, the persuasive type, and use that as our template on how to create a power-ful body. All other types of speeches will follow this pattern to some extent, even though the goal will not be to persuade the audience of an opinion. So if you are giving an informative speech or a demonstrative speech, you won’t be concerned with the aspect of proving your opinion to be true, but you will still be able to use this structure to build the body of your speech.