Note from Chris: I have been super busy the past few months, so I have started to look for people to guest post on the blog. This allows me to continue to bring you useful information on Public Speaking and Toastmasters while giving me some time to work on my free membership site youngprofitpros.com and other projects. This guest post comes from Heidi Taylor. If you are interested in guest posting, contact me.
Public speaking is not a skill which is unattainable; rather, it comes with experience and knowledge of what your audience wants. It is helpful for many business professionals to ensure that their children get involved with public speaking from the time they are well into junior high. There are many programs for young children to encourage speech-writing, impromptu speeches, and debates. If you want your child to be able to speak in front of a committee or large audience, it is helpful to enroll them in these types of programs from an early age.
Once your child reaches junior high, there is a multitude of after-school programs that are academically based. The University Interscholastic League (UIL) is one of the largest programs within junior high and high schools in the state of Texas, and participates in debates, persuasive speaking, and impromptu speaking, where the child is given a subject and must come up with a speech within five minutes. While this type of extracurricular program is unique to Texas, many other states participate in state wide debates, and other speech-writing activities. It has become progressively more important to educate the new generation in terms of public speaking due to the large amount of speaking business professionals have to do on a daily basis. With the job market becoming even more competitive, it is imperative that the new generation be avid public speakers to be able to impress potential employers, as well as corporate sponsors.
Furthermore, a solid educational background will assist children in speech-writing, not only for these competitions, but also later on in life. Ardent readers will be better informed, and therefore more apt to create well-written and rehearsed speeches; it is more important now more than ever that your children become well educated outside of school through reading literature and current events. All of this starts with the parents, when their children are young enough to be conditioned as to how to read and speak in front of large audiences. If they receive this training while they are still young, they are more apt to carry this with them to adulthood.
Public speaking is a very important skill to have all through your life, and it can make a difference when you enter the job market as to whether you can impress a potential employer with your skills during an interview, or impress an audience during a conference. It is this fact that makes it so important to establish these types of expertise very early on in life.
This post was contributed by Heidi Taylor, who writes about the online colleges and universities. She welcomes your feedback at HeidiLTaylor006 at gmail.com.
). It’s artificial, in that the structures it imposes are not those required by business, and it artificially raises the level of anxiety associated with public speaking and presenting.
I love seeing kids try the art. I entered a speaking contest in the fourth grade (I totally bombed), but that experience really helped me deal with some fears at an early age.
My son is six and show and tell is a required activity every week. The teacher is grading them on a lot of the things that adult speakers work on every day!
Great post!