ACE Class Report #85 : Mastering Stage Presence
Begin: 1/9/2025
Finish: 3/27/2025
Title: Mastering Stage Presence – Public Speaking
Instructor: Henry Ku
Why I choose to take this class:
The art of public speaking is used in our everyday life. This class will help me improve my public speaking skills. This class teaches us the skills needed to speak on any occasion.
What I learned from this class:
Overcome Obstacles – Demosthenes of Athens:
1) Make up your mind that you can and will overcome fears and obstacles.
2) Practice, Practice, practice every aspect of public speaking.
3) Use cross-training in acting, sports and other field to improve your skills.
4) Work on memorization.
5) Accept early failures, and persist with your effort.
Practice Your Delivery – Patrick Henry:
Nothing should ever happen that is not motivated by something in words, but you will infinitely reinforce your impact of your words with proper use of voice and body.
1) Use your voice and body language to reinforce your message.
2) Always match your voice and movements to specific words and emotions.
3) When first start out as a speaker, mark the tone and gestures into your text as reminders, they are as important as the words themselves.
4) Establish and maintain eye contact with your audience.
5) In cases where you are not inciting a revolution, smile.
Be Yourself – Elizabeth I to Her Army:
Speak about yourself and weakness adds to the sense of authenticity, of communication, of revelations and feel closer to people.
1) Explain your personal connection to the subject of your speech.
2) Share your own emotions, beliefs, and ideas, and don’t shy away from revealing your weakness and failures.
3) Establish a personal line with your listeners as the start of your speech.
4) Use plain, direct language, but never talk down to your audience.
5) Don’t hesitate to read your speech from script if necessary.
Find Your Humorous Voice – Will Rogers:
There is nothing that unifies and audience more than laughter.
1) Laugh at yourself before you laugh at others.
2) Comedy helps relax your audience specially at formal occasions.
3) Use humor to focus on your theme, not to distance from it.
4) Jokes can illuminate serious points, provide new thoughts an perspectives.
5) Your humor should reflect your own personality.
Make It a Story – Mary Curie on Discovery:
The speech has two components: It has the substance of the speech, and it has the organization or the manner of presenting it to your audience.
1) Use stories and narratives to make your speech easy to follow and the details easy to understand an remember.
2) Clearly identify your theme at the beginning of your speech.
3) Include vivid and memorable details that bring your subject to life.
4) Anticipate you audience’s question, and provide the answer in the body of your speech.
Use the Power of Three – Paul To His People:
1) Construct your speech in three parts: introduction, body and conclusion.
2) Create a rhythm with clauses, examples, and parallel sentences in group of three.
3) Use adjectives and other short sentences of word in three.
Build A Logical Case – Susan B. Anthony:
Start with an axiom, going on to definition and demonstration of different points and end with a conclusion.
1) Use clear, concise, but neutral reasoning. Avoid personal issues and emotion appeal.
2) Base your argument on axiom, laws, self-evident truth, present them near the beginning of your speech.
3) Define your terms, and make those definitions into stepping stones as you work towards providing your point.
4) Focus on providing a single point, rigorously avoid side issues and unnecessary digressions..
5) Check the accuracy of your facts.
Paint Pictures in Words – Tecumseh on Unity:
1) Focus the attention of your listeners with words that create images in their mind.
2) Use poetic languages to make your words easy to recollect and more evocative of memories, of feelings, of shared experience with your audience.
3) Make abstract observations and principles vivid to your listeners by adding concrete, easy to picture examples.
4) Apply images an vivid language when you are speaking from the heart.
Focus on Your Audience – Gandhi on Trial:
1) Ask yourself in advance, “who is my audience?” and adapt your speech to address them particularly and directly.
2) Your tone, your language, and your examples should all be chosen with a specific audience in mind.
3) Always be courteous, respectful, sympathetic, and mindful of your audience comfort.
Shared A Vision – Martin Luther King’s Dream:
1) Integrate all three kinds of appeals – logic, personal, concerns, and emotions – if you want to make the most satisfying and most compelling case.
2) If you want to create the feeling of visions, repeat words and phrases.
3) Weave familiar quotations and references to well known texts into your speech.
4) Divide a long speech into three clear-cut sections; give each section its own particular take on your theme.
5) Maintain eye contact with your audience, and maintain your energy while reading quotes. Use pauses and changes in vocal tones to set quotes apart from your text.
Change Minds and Hearts – Mark Anthony:
” It is the province of knowledge to speak an it is the privilege’s of wisdom to listen” – Oliver Holmes.
1) Make a strong beginning.
2) Use props to illustrate and reinforce the points in your speech.
3) Avoid projecting and distributing printed materials while you are speaking.
4) In an argument, be relentless in speaking well of your opponent and courteously allowing for certain opinions.
5) Pace yourself, move step by step in an argument to keep your audience with you.
6) Focus always on concrete points, not on abstractions.
Call For Positive Action – Lincoln at Gettysburg:
1) Create empathy between yourself and your listeners with your words.
2) Combine Ethos (The idea of personality) and pathos (The idea of healing), shift the focus of your speech from”I” or “you” to “We”.
How will this class contribute to my success upon release:
This class improves my writing, reading, public speaking skills, analytical and critical thinking skills and also make me a better speaker. The importance of public speaking skills can be used in my teaching, tutoring and mentoring duties upon my release. This skill will allow me to secure better employment opportunities as well as volunteering positions.
