I have a few concerns regarding this assignment. Firstly, public speaking is not my strength. When presenting something in front of the class, I tend to speak too fast or too slowly. It is hard for me to simply talk and I also often forget some of the components of my presentation- not because I haven’t sufficiently prepared for it, but more so due to mental blocks. For this assignment, I worry that I will not have enough to talk about. To extend my speech, I will try to go into more depth on certain aspects of the Ad, especially its context.
For the problem with speaking too fast or too slow, I know people who create rhythm to maintain consistency. By that, I mean use your finger or hand as a sort of metronome. Tap it against your leg or the podium to help you maintain a sort of rhythm. Then you have something to follow as you speak. As for the content of your speech, I believe that as long as you hit the main points you will be fine. To my understanding, we can spend as much time on each of the areas as we want as long as we touch upon all important parts of rhetoric.
These concerns make a lot of sense. It is so weird how when you start speaking in front of a group of people, your brain just kinda of freezes up, no matter how prepared you are. I can totally empathize with your thoughts about not having enough information, as I think we are talking about similar civic artifacts. If you know your topic and feel passionate about your speech I think everything will go well!
Peace of mind is a large factor in giving a good speech. Try to read the speech to yourself in your head over and over again, until you truly believe in what you are arguing or presenting. Believe me, I’ve had to give speeches about topics that I did not care about at all, but I managed to convince myself that I did. You may have 1000 thoughts on a topic, or you may have just 1, but what matters there is that you can argue it. Drive the point home. Make us understand it. Remember, we are in the same block, we don’t want to have to get up and speak either. Try watching some famous speeches, and see the voice cues and confidence in their voices, and see if that helps!