Chapter 11: Developing Your Professional
Presentation
Chapter Context
This chapter describes strategies to help manage your communication apprehension and
analyze an audience before, during, and after a presentation; creating a presentation topic;
Outcome-based Outline
Outcome
Learning Objectives
Critical Thinking
11.1 Identify the primary
causes of communication
apprehension and identify
strategies to overcome
apprehension.
11.2 Investigate the
importance of knowing your
audience
Communication
11.4 Recommend appropriate
ways to develop and use
supporting material in a
speech.
11.5 Express ways to
effectively deliver your
presentation
Knowledge of Discipline
11.3 Describe the factors that
need to be considered while
selecting the presentation
topic
Discussion Question Bank
This discussion question bank provides a listing of discussion questions (1-2 per module),
which are included for in-class use.
Module
Discussion Question(s)
11.1 Confidently
Communicating to Others
1. Recall the moments leading up to you giving a
presentation in school, college, or place of work.
How nervous and anxious were you feeling at the
time? What were your thoughts at that moment,
and how did you handle it?
2. Recollect a time when your parents or a mentor
encouraged you to speak fearlessly and
confidently. Discuss the various suggestions and
tips they gave. How did you incorporate their
advice, and how did taking those steps help you
shun your fears and speak confidently?
11.2 Consider Your Audience
1. How often have you customized a speech
according to your audience? Analyze how
audiences are the focus point, and their
cooperation is equally required for a successful
presentation.
2. After giving a presentation, what measures do
you typically use to gauge the audience’s
response? Elaborate on the reasons for choosing
your method of preference. Describe how you
analyzed the audience before and after your
speech.
11.3 Select and Narrow Your
Topic
1. Based on your experience, how do you customize
a topic to fit your audience? How different is it
working on topics your instructor or mentor
chose for you during school and college to the
topics you use professionally for specific
reasons?
2. Provide examples of a few central ideas that you
organized into smaller ideas for a speech. Why
was this process an important factor for
presenting a speech?
11.4 Support Your
Presentation
1. Recall the response of the audience when you
used interesting anecdotes and incidents from
personal experience in a speech. How did using
such devices make the presentation more
effective? What other supporting material did
you use for the presentation, and why?
2. Consider a real-life instance when an audience
member challenged statistical data that you had
gathered from the Internet and shared during a
presentation, but that you could not rebut
immediately. How did you handle the situation,
and why is such statistical information collected
from the Web not a reliable source?
11.5 Organize Your
Presentation
1. Recollect a presentation when the speaker gave
an outstanding speech that was simple and left
an impression on you for a long time. What
factors drew you toward the speech? Evaluate
the importance of such organized speeches.
2. Assess why the conclusion is as important as the
introduction of a speech.
Research Assignments
The following research assignments pertain to the main topics and/or themes of the chapter.
Please respond by writing a paper consisting of 1,000-1,500 words.
Overcoming the Apprehensions of Public Speaking
Public speaking is considered the greatest fear for most people, and many approach it with
great stress and trepidation. Write a report analyzing how cultures and traditions affect the
way people process messages, and what strategies can be used to overcome them.
Experiential Activity
Quell the Butterflies
Goals:
To address communication apprehension in public address
Group size
Entire class
Time required
Fifty minutes
Procedure
2. Ask students about the symptoms that affect them when they speak publicly.
4. Make them breathe from the diaphragm. With their hands on their diaphragm,
have them say, “Good Morning, Your Name!” They should feel the vibration if
5. Next have them put their left hand in a bucket of goo. Then shake it and say “Ew!”
really loudly.
6. Have them stiffen their bodies from their feet, to their knees, to their stomachs,
7. Loosen the neck and shoulder muscles by rotating the head forward, to the left,
then to the right.
8. You can then have them sit down and do a relaxing visualization exercise.
Turning off the lights helps with this.
Discussion
How have these relaxation exercises helped them?
Do they feel more relaxed now than when they walked into the classroom?
Experiential Activity
Outline Preparation
Goals
•
To research the symposium topic using credible sources
•
To organize the main idea using the most effective format
•
To create an interesting introduction
•
To summarize the presentation in the conclusion of the speech
Group size
Class groups of four
Time required
Class period
Procedure
2. Students get into their groups and round robin their outlines. After each team
3. After looking over each other’s outlines, students determine the appropriate order of
their presentation.
5. In the conclusion of the outlines, there should be a brief introduction to the next
speaker.
6. Outlines should then be submitted the following class in a group folder for the
lecturer to review prior to the delivery date of the speeches.
Discussion
Lecturer asks each group to submit a sheet of paper with symposium topic and the order in
which the speakers will present.
If time, the lecturer could look over the sheets and discuss symposium topics and the
breakdown of the topic into the four subject areas.
Do each of the speeches contain an effective attention getter in the beginning
of the speech? Is there speaker credibility mentioned in the introduction?