Organizing Your Speech: Prepared By: HERBERT M. TABIOS
Organizing Your Speech: Prepared By: HERBERT M. TABIOS
As a speaker, your role is to tell others about your ideas and occas
ionally persuade them to take some action. Your audience will be
more receptive to your efforts if you take the time to assemble your
thoughts in a logical manner. Well-organized speeches have sever
al benefits for the audience.
Easier to understand. Your audience wants to know what your speech is about and the point
you are trying to make. A well-organized speech helps them do so.
Easier to remember. A well-organized speech enables the audience to better identify and rem
ember the points you made.
More credible. Speakers who take the time to carefully organize their presentations are perce
ived as more knowledgeable and believable than those who give rambling, disjointed speeche
s.
More enjoyable. Audiences appreciate presentations that are thoughtfully crafted and lead t
hem step by step from the beginning to the end.
Organizing your Speech
Select Your Topic
• Your first step in creating your speech is to decide what to talk about. Novice speak
ers sometimes find this difficult. The world is full of possible speech topics. Your ch
allenge is to select the best one for you and your audience. Finding a topic doesn’t
require special ability or long hours of research or thought. Consider, for example,
• Discussions you’ve had recently with friends or coworkers
• Your expertise on certain topics – real estate, writing, personal computers, etc.
This speech splits the main topic into subtopics. For example, a sp
eech about changing radio programming could address three differ
ent types of programming: music, news and talk shows.
Organizing your Speech
Problem-solution.
You present a problem that needs to be solved and a solution to th
at problem. This type of organization is effective if you are trying to
motivate your audience to take some kind of action. For example,
a speech describing the effect of water pollution on people and the
environment fits this organizational pattern, provided it lists source
s of water pollution in your town and describes what can be done
to stop it.
Develop the Opening
• The opening should immediately catch the audience’s attention and t
ell the audience what you will be talking about. Examples of a good o
pening are:
• A startling question or a challenging statement
• An apologetic statement
• The body is the main part of your speech and consists of the fact
s or ideas you want to present. The amount of information you in
clude in the body will be limited by the amount of time available t
o you and how much the audience can remember. Most listeners
will remember only three to five main facts or ideas. For a five- to
seven-minute talk, three facts or ideas are plenty.
Draft the Body
• What facts or ideas do you want to convey? You may find it helpf
ul to write down all of those related to your topic on small note ca
rds, using one card per idea or fact and one sentence per idea or
fact. Then select the three best or most important facts or ideas.
These will be the main facts or ideas you will present. Arrange th
em in the order that will most effectively present your message.
Draft the Body
• What facts or ideas do you want to convey? You may find it helpf
ul to write down all of those related to your topic on small note ca
rds, using one card per idea or fact and one sentence per idea or
fact. Then select the three best or most important facts or ideas.
These will be the main facts or ideas you will present. Arrange th
em in the order that will most effectively present your message.
Draft the Body
• B. Body
• 1. Main point
– Subpoint
– Supportmaterial
• Main point
– Subpoint
– Supportmaterial
• Main point
– Subpoint
– Supportmaterial
• C. Conclusion
• Review or summary
References
•Dlugan, A. (2014). Toastmasters Speech 2: Organize your speech. Six Minutes [Website].