Public Speaking

Planning Your Presentation Aids (^169)
2011 has obsolete sections because a new country, South Sudan, was added in July of
that year.
• Geographic maps show mountains, deserts, lowlands, and other natural features.
They are updated only when remote or previously unexplored territories, such as
areas of the ocean floor, are mapped.
• Other maps include building blueprints and floor plans, maps of routes between two
points, city maps, and campus maps.
Photographs The old saying “A picture is worth a thousand words” is not necessarily
true. Pictures are of little value if they are merely decorative or if your audience cannot
see them. However, many students successfully use photographs. Shane showed pictures
of drones, and Zitong showed snapshots from Chinese weddings. For his speech on
aqualungs, Casey projected a large, high-resolution photograph of a beetle that scientists
used as a model for aqualung development.
To use photographs successfully, choose only high-resolution images. Also find a
way to display your photos so that everyone can see them. Avoid passing a photo around;
only the person closest to you sees the picture as you explain it, but the last person sees
it long after you’ve described it. Put the source of the photo on the visual and in your
list of references.
Graphs As Chapter 8 pointed out, speeches full of numerical data are often boring,
difficult to follow, and impossible to remember without some sort of visual. Depicting
your material in one of four types of graphs allows your listeners to see how your num-
bers relate to one another.

1. Line graphs present information in linear form; they are best for showing
   variables that fluctuate over time, such as changes in tuition over two decades.
   They are also good for showing the relationship of two or more variables, such
   as a comparison of state and private school averages during the same period.
   (Figure 13.3a on the following page shows fluctuation in the funding of three
   projects over a fifteen-year period.)


2. Bar graphs compare data from several groups such as the salaries of men and
   women with differing educational levels. (See Figure 13.3b.)


3. Pie graphs are especially good for showing divisions of a population or parts of
   the whole. The pie graph in Figure 13.3c depicts ways typical Americans get to
   work.


4. Picture graphs or pictographs, the least common of the four types, are especially
   effective for data related to objects or people. Each picture represents a certain
   number of individual cases, as Figure 13.3d demonstrates.
   In summary, three-dimensional objects and text- or image-based visuals are useful
   in visually oriented cultures. However, in some cases, recordings of sounds or images are
   even more effective support.

Video and Audio Support

Audio and video support requires extra preparation and planning, but these resources

can help you better convey certain types of information.

Audio Resources

Audio support is particularly important with music- or sound-related topics. Your audi-

ence can hear the sounds you are explaining, whether your topic is a musical style, a

specific instrument, or a particular composer’s works. Although less common, you can

geographic maps shows

mountains, deserts, and

other natural features; not

easily outdated

line graph displays in a

linear form one or more

variables that fluctuate over a

time period

bar graph compares data

from several groups by using

bands of various lengths

pie graph represents parts

of the whole or divisions of a

population by circles divided

into portions

picture graph or pictograph

presents data in pictures,

each representing a certain

number of individual cases

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