Informative Speech
Guidelines
The goal of
informative speaking is to increase the audience’s awareness and understanding by imparting knowledge. Informative speeches provide an audience with new information, new insights, or new ways of thinking about a topic.
Your responsibility, as the informative speaker, is to deepen your audience’s understanding and to increase their knowledge about your Informative topic that directly
RELATES to your PERSUASIVE topic.
YOU WILL NOT BE ADVOCATING ANY CHANGE IN YOUR INFORMATIVE SPEECH! This speech is just an
informational foundation to your Persuasive argument. You should not give away any evidence base information relating to your Persuasive speech i.e. statistics, facts, or reasoning supporting your Persuasive claim. The objectives for the Informative Speech are to DEFINE, DESCRIBE, EXPLAIN, and sometimes DEMONSTRATE.
You will first need to choose AND post in the appropriate
Falcon Online’s discussion board by the due date and time (please refer to the syllabus) a topic relating to your Persuasive topic you wish to research and speak on.
For the Introduction of the speech: Please open your speech with a strong
attention grabber to capture your audience’s attention into your speech (i.e. quote, visual, interesting fact…etc.). The
connection with your audience is
HOW IT RELATES TO YOUR PERSUASIVE TOPIC.
The
thesis statement is your main focus (central idea) of your Informative speech.
Please remember to include a
preview of points as the last part of your introduction; you can have it as a separate statement, or combine it with your thesis statement. The preview of points are your
SPECIFIC three main body points you will be discussing in the BODY of the Informative speech.
For the Body of the speech: You will need to structure and organize
3 main points to discuss your chosen Informative topic. The body of your speech should be well organized with clear transitions between the body points. The body of your speech should be around 75% – 80% of your speech time. This is the part of the speech where you share all of the research you have collected and organized to enlighten your audience about your topic.
There are various aspects you may wish to research for your Informative Speech. One way is to discuss the
historical foundation of your chosen Persuasive topic.
FIRST conduct some
INITIAL research on your chosen Persuasive topic. You may find that you may NEED to discuss the historical foundation of that Persuasive topic. If so, then that becomes your Informative speech topic.
If you discover in your research that discussing the history of your Persuasive speech topic would be the most logical, then you will need to organize your 3 main body points in your Informative speech in a Chronological pattern:
Body Point 1, you discuss the ORIGIN or GENESIS of your Persuasive topic.
Body Point 2, discuss the chronological evolution of the Persuasive topic
Body Point 3, you may need to discuss the current events of your Persuasive topic.
The History is not the only option for your Informative speech topic. Perhaps you need to discuss three other elements, topics, or categories of your Persuasive speech topic not related to time. For example, if your Persuasive claim is: “Paranormal phenomena should be considered a legitimate science”, then your topics to discuss and detail could include 3 different types of paranormal phenomena like:
Body Point 1 Define, Describe, Explain the phenomenon of Telekinesis
Body Point 2 Define, Describe, Explain the phenomenon of Extra Sensory
Perception
Body Point 3 Define, Describe, Explain the phenomenon of Near Death
Experience
Or perhaps you discover in your research three events related to your Persuasive topic where each body point is a well narrated description of an event that relates to your Persuasive topic:
Body Point 1 Event one well narrated and detailed
Body Point 2 Event two well narrated and detailed
Body Point 3 Event three well narrated and detailed
PLEASE do NOT discuss the effects of (positive or negative), the problems or issues (the cause of the problem/issue), pros and/or cons
, benefits, and/or consequences
of your Persuasive speech
topic
. This material belongs in your Persuasive speech/argument.
PLEASE REMEMBER: You will only have
6 – 8 minutes to discuss all the interesting and new information on your Informative topic, so choose your research and information wisely and organize it well. Please use the outline to help organize and structure your speech to engage and inform your audience about your Persuasive claim.
Start each body point with a
topic
sentence that telegraphs to your audience what that body point will contain. Include and detail your body points (subpoints and further supports) with the interesting facts you discover in your research of your chosen Informative topic.
*
Failure to orally cite your sources in your speech is considered plagiarism and a grade of
0
will be assigned to the speech.
For the Conclusion of the speech: Remember to begin your Conclusion with a
recap, restatement of your thesis and preview. This will let your audience know you have presented your research and you are coming to the close of your speech.
Your
final thought is also important because this is the last impression you leave your audience with on your topic. You can use a quote, visual, etc. to end your speech.
NEVER introduce
NEW material in your conclusion…this is just an ending to your speech!
PLEASE REMEMBER: The number of sources for this speech is
3 – 5 credible, academic sources. These sources
MUST be orally cited in your speech and a Works Cited page in the proper MLA format must be included in your outline.
Please refer to the
syllabus regarding oral citations and the works cited page for this speech ~
no exceptions!
A
visual aid is a
requirement for this speech; the visual aid must be
projected images such as a PowerPoint, Prezi. Video/Audio clips are also applicable and can be used well in this speech.
You will have
30
– 45
seconds TOTAL for a video clip and will be included in your speaking time. Please refer to the PowerPoint I have posted on Falcon Online in the content section of our class for additional help.
- • There is a 4 – 8 slide (PowerPoint or Prezi) requirement.
- • All pictures obtained from the internet or outside sources MUST be cited on your visual aid. If they are your own personal pictures, you may just put “personal photo”.
The Informative full sentence outline and PPT must be submitted in the Falcon Online’s appropriate assignment box by the due date and time.
You may use notecards only to help you during the speech, NO OUTLINES!
No hats with brims, no sunglasses, NO GUM or CANDY in your mouth!
Dress casually and enjoy!
