Oral Presentations

[fullhouseforever]

What are your thoughts about oral presentations?  I was thinking about this randomly the other day, and I'm not a big fan of them.  It's effective for people who thrive on it but it's completely out of my personal comfort zone.  I have a tendency to lose my train of thought in the heat of the spotlight, lol.

[link]

funny you mention this lol i was supposed to have an oral quiz today in spanish but school got canceled.
i get nervous about messing up which usually makes me mess up, so i'm better at writing answers down.

[fullhouseforever]

Yeah, I definitely much prefer writing too.  So I guess you'll have to do your oral quiz tomorrow then instead?

[Csoup715]

I kind of like them because I'm pretty good at thinking on my feet....I'd rather do an oral presentation than write a paper any day

[Left Turn]

Some oral presentations I really enjoy, some I really don't. It really depends on

1) whether I find the topic interesting
2) my familiarity with the topic
3) length (more an issue if 1 and/or 2 are not in my favour)
4) whether I have to memorize it (more of an issue the less familiar I am with the topic)

It's fun to give a presentation on a topic I like, and that I know really well. It's not really fun to give a presentation on a topic I dislike and know nothing about.

So for intstance, I would like doing presentations on topics like the Israel/Palestine conflict, the Russian Revolution, social housing, opposing the 2010 olypics, the economic crisis, ect. On the other hand, I would not enjoy giving a presentation on any business topics.
 

[fullhouseforever]

I'm about as uncomfortable with topics I like and topics I don't, though there is the plus that if you know more about it you can compensate in a lot of ways in case you go slightly off track.

[SweetMichelle]

I don't like giving speeches at all! I have Social Anxiety and my voice gets all shaky, I start studdering, sweating, blushing, playing with my hair like crazy... So yeah, I hate them. When I was in high school I would always ask my teacher if I could do my speech after class in front of a couple people I know and they usually said no so I just didn't do it - that's how much I hate them. Sometimes the nicer teachers let me but that was rare. I have many embarrassing moments from having to do speeches. I didn't even end up getting my speech proficentcy (sp?) until graduation day.

[fullhouseforever]

Hmm, sounds rough.  I've known a couple people who just couldn't perform doing oral presentations and had to stop...thankfully I can get through it and my voice is usually pretty good.  My nervousness shows more in a bit of shakiness and word mangling.

[jenessa]

I HATE presenting! I think its because I am a really shy person so getting up in front of the class and talking makes me really uncomfortable. Although if it is a small class its not really that bad. I actually don't mind talking in front of my yearbook class, I'm peer tutoring it so sometimes I have to but since there is only 12 people not counting me I'm fine with it. Plus its always yearbook or graphic design related mostly and I am comfortable speaking about that since I know enough about it.

[fullhouseforever]

Yeah 12 people wouldn't be so bad.  I remember when I had very small French classes and everyone knew each other well so those presentations were pretty easy.  One year we had 15 and another we had 9 (it was a split class from another grade but the other grade left for that).

[jenessa]

Ya thats the kind of class that I will actually talk a lot in for some reason, Although if I know some of the people it makes getting up in front of the class a whole lot easier.

[fullhouseforever]

Yeah, the toughest presentations I ever had were ones near the beginning of the year, in large classes where I wasn't particularly familiar with my peers.  Thankfully most presentations ended up closer to the end of the year at least and in classes I was less worried about.  Even still I was a bit uncomfortable in that setting.

[Mikayli]

I HATE oral presentations!  I tend to zone out and it's the worst, because I'm talking but not totally in touch with myself, so I'm talking but don't exactly know what I'm saying!

[fullhouseforever]

Yeah, I get what you mean by that.  I can't concentrate on the idea because I'm so focused on the presenting.  Of course, there's the occasional moment where I come up with something pretty neat off the top of my head that I might not have otherwise pondered, so I guess it goes either way.

[Paris! :)]

I have never met anyone who loved public speaking. Speaking to random strangers a few at a time is alright with me, as long as I don't have to speak to large groups of people at once. D: My voice just tends to crack up when I'm in those situations lol, but I try to keep it under control.