In preparation for the speeches we are going to be presenting next week, I have been looking back on my rather short history of giving speeches and the strong and weak points of each. The first speech I remember giving was in fourth grade for student council. I was running against one of the teacher's pets in the class and I felt a bit distressed. She went up there and gave a nice five minute long talk about making school lunches healthier and that we could have longer silent reading times. I began to panic due to her seemingly perfect points that would win any fourth grade teacher over. Feeling my defeat as I walked to the front of the class, I completely blanked on every point I had and ended up uttering a single sentence before scuttling back to my desk. That single sentence won me the votes of my peers and gave me the position of our class's representative in student council.

What was the aww inspiring sentence that made twenty fourth graders deem me worthy enough of leading their class you ask. "If you want to be jolly, vote for Molly!" Although it was more of a mumble so the exclamation point may be out of place. Once I discovered I won, I figured out that it wasn't my teacher who was voting for my but my friends. Quite frankly, no fourth grade kid is going to be jumping for joy at the idea of healthy lunches and that teacher's pet was not appealing to her audience. I did not realize this until years later of course but the lesson was learned.

During my senior year, we had to create a senior project and then present it to our English class and then a panel of judges. By far, one of the most nerve-wracking moments in my life. While listening to my classmates give their speeches I was always struck by their vocabulary or style of speaking. Many kids went for the I'm-a-super-genius-so-I'm-going-to-use-huge-words approach while others went for the good ole talk to us like we are about seven years old. Anytime someone spoke with in those ways, I was unable to really pay attention to anything they were saying. Some kids speeches were so scientifically worded that I was lost within the first minute. Their intro sentence was riddled with words they had difficulty pronouncing. Those who dumbed it down were using a vocabulary with about five words and seemed as though they were reading from a See Spot Run book.

Seeing these examples, I now take into account my audience better and what they would like to hear. Most elementary school students don't want more quite time, they want funny little sayings they can remember for the rest of the day. Most high school seniors don't want to sit through hours of incomprehensible speeches or ones that insult their intelligence, they want speeches that are easy to follow and that catch your interest.