Teacher Resources: Course Description and Pedagogy: Public Speaking

Required Texts & Basic Student Requirements | Goals & Assumptions | Points of Emphasis | Error | Public Speaking

Public Speaking
All students must complete the Public Speaking requirement, which is designed to place their written work in the larger context of social action. Teachers should make the arrangements necessary to ensure that each student has three opportunities during the term for oral presentations of five to ten minutes in length. These opportunities might include the following:

• Interpretations of an assigned reading not yet discussed in class
• Responses to questions on the assigned reading prepared in advance by the teacher
• Presentations of "paper abstracts": 5 to 10 minute summaries of the most recently completed final drafts
• Presentations of work in progress: 5 to 10 minute summaries of preliminary drafts prior to peer revision

In addition, all students are required to make one presentation on a grammar or syntax issue. A teacher might schedule three or four presentations on the day final drafts are due or in preparation for class discussion of a new text. Alternately, two or three students might make brief (5 minute) presentations of their rough drafts as a prelude to group work. Although presentations are not graded, some effort at evaluation should be made. Teachers should direct class attention to well-constructed and well-executed talks, while eliciting constructive criticism of the less skillful presentations.