What is effective speaking?
Effective speaking is the confidence and the ability to succinctly and clearly deliver your message, whether it is to an individual or to a large group of people.
Why train in effective speaking?
Verbal communication skills are crucial in many professional fields, from sales to education. In fact, the power to speak effectively and efficiently gives us an advantage in all speaking situations.
What are the components of effective speaking?
Voice Production– inflection, projection
Breath Support – A subcomponent of developing command of your voice is learning proper breath support to sustain a richer, fuller, and stronger voice.
Pace – A natural pace that allows time for listener(s) to assimilate what you are saying
Clarity – clear articulation
Nonverbal Communication – gestures and posture
Why are Speech-Language Pathologists uniquely qualified to provide this training?
We have specialized training in the ‘musical aspects’ of speech (supra-segmentals or prosodic features). These features can be used to increase the impact of the speaker’s message.
Some common supra-segmental features are the stress, tone, and duration in the syllable or word. For example, lexical stress (accent on a syllable) helps the listener to distinguish between trusty and trustee. Sentence stress (accent on certain words in a sentence or utterance) helps to convey specific meaning (I didn’t say he took the money vs. I didn’t say he took the money).
We also are trained in the mechanisms involved in speech production – respiration (lungs), phonation (larynx), and articulators (mouth) and how to maximize the function of these mechanisms in speech production.
