Religious Service Speech Analysis

Danielle McIntyre

Public Speaking

Speech Analysis

12/3/2012

Speech Analysis

A. I went to Kingston United Methodist Church and the Pastor there is Earlene Lekwa. Earlene is from Columbus Junction Iowa and has been a pastor for some time. Aside from being a Pastor Earlene also works at a Preschool. Earlene has been the Pastor at Kingston United Methodist Church for a little over two years now and is very well liked by the congregation there.

B. Kingston United Methodist Church is not a very big church so the Sanctuary is not that large. The windows are all stained glass and the lights weren’t very bright so the room wasn’t that bright. It would have been much brighter if it had been a sunny day outside. The temperature in the room was warm, but comfortable. Some people probably would have found it too hot but I thought it was good. During the service people around me were whispering which I found very distracting. This is something that I notice whenever I attend this church and I noticed it very much since I was analyzing the speaker and the situation this time. I also noticed a lot of people coughing and sniffling which was very distracting and just plain annoying.

C. The pastor began with announcements and then Joys and Concerns. The part that I am analyzing, though, is the sermon. Pastor Earlene began her Sermon with a story from the bible. In the story a woman in the bible’s husband dies. Earlene talks about how in life sometimes things are going good and then you hit a bump in the road. Pastor Earlene encourages you to go to family when times get tough just like the woman in the bible did. She also stresses that God loves you and will always be there in the good times and in the bad. We must put our faith in God and Trust in God and his plans for us. We have to remember to do this even in the bad times.

Pastor Earlene also talks about love and how we must love God, self, and neighbor, even when it is hard to love some people we should do it to please God. We hold onto some things that we think we love that we sometimes put ahead of God and we need to put these things down. She also stated that the word love often times gets used to freely in todays world and that we shouldn’t use the word too freely. She ended with a very touching story.

D. I thought Pastor Earlene did very well. She was very conversational and had good eye contact. She used a mic. And was very easy to hear and understand. She had notes in front of her, but they weren’t used often. Her sermon went about eight minutes over, and it did seem a bit rushed because she knew she was running out of time.

E. Overall I thought the speech was very good. It was well organized and easy to understand which is sometimes hard to do because the bible can be confusing. I thought she connected it to the real world very well. She included real life stories and you could tell that everyone was really listening. I was very glad that I had to go to church to do this analysis because it turned out to be a very good sermon and I really took something away from it. 

12/3/2012 Performance

1. Danielle McIntyre
2. Climate Change
3. I liked that I used my note cards a very minimal amount. I also liked the introduction to my speech.
4. My peers thought that my speech needed to be longer and have more information
5. I tried to have more sources and information so my speech this week was longer than my speech last week.
6. To improve I need more information so it is longer.

11/28/2012 Performance

1. Danielle McIntyre
2.What might the current Lame Duck Congress accomplish?
3. I liked my particular topic. I also liked that i was fairly knowledgeable on my information before doing my speech.
4. My peers thought it needed to be a lot longer
5. In all honesty I don't think I did any better today than I did on Monday. I didn't spend enough time making my speech better.
6. To improve I need a lot more information so that it is a lot longer.

11/26/2012 Perfomance

1. Danielle McIntyre 11/26/2012
2. What might the lame duck congress accomplish?
3. I liked the topic I chose because I was knowledgeble on some of the issues so I didn't have to use my script a lot. I also liked how I kept my explanations simple so they were easy for the audience to understand.
4. My peers thought that it needed to be longer. They also wanted to know more about the farm bill. They thought the Benghazi information was interesting.
5. I thought that my speech was more informational than my one from last week.
6. I hope to expand on my information to make my speech much longer.

11/14 Performance

1. Danielle McIntyre 11/14/2012
2. How has service in the military affected you?
3. I liked that I didn't have a script. I had a very rough outline that I followed
4. My peers thought that it needed to be longer. They thought i was very easy to understand though
5. This was the first day of platform speeches
6. To improve I want to have a little better plan as to what I want to say. I also need to add stuff to make it longer.

Forum Analysis

Danielle McIntyre

Public Speaking

Speech Analysis

10/30/2012

A.    The speaker that I analyzed was Robert. Robert works with the United Nations Foundation.

B.     Forum was held in the Chapel. I thought that the temperature was a bit cold. I find it difficult to concentrate when I’m cold, so this was a bit of an issue for me. The sound was good. He used a mic. And it was easy to hear and understand him. The chapel seemed a bit dark which kind of made me tired. I think it is easier to concentrate and stay awake if it is bright and light. People were quiet for most of the speech so there weren’t many distractions.

C.     The speakers theme was to inform students about the United Nations Foundation and get us involved. The speaker began by thanking the audience for being there and he stated his mission or why he was there. The speaker then told what the United Nations Foundation does. The United Nations Foundation promotes the US paying off its debts and also promotes and supports the United States and United Nations relationship. He gave a very large amount of background information. The speaker then told about how he wants to get young people involved. He spoke very briefly about how to get involved and then ended with audience questions. He had a lot of information to answer audience questions.

D.    As for the presentation the speaker did well. I noted that the speaker was very loud. He wasn’t too loud, he just had a strong voice. He was very easy to understand. The speaker also seemed prepared because he didn’t say umm a lot, which is something many speakers do. He talked with his hands once in a while. The speaker also had very good eye contact. He seemed very confident in his speaking. The speaker was also dressed very well. As for the rule dress slightly better than your audience, he may have over did it. The speaker didn’t use any presentation aids, which can be a good thing because there was no technology to go wrong.

E.     Overall I thought the speech was boring, but the speaker was okay. He seemed passionate about what he was talking about and he kept my attention for most of the speech. I thought he did a very good job seeming confident especially when people were asking him questions. The speaker seemed ethical, but I don’t think he would have admitted to the United Nations having any faults, so he was somewhat biased when it came to that. I thought he should have told more about how the United Nations related to us as students and also more on how we could get involved. I felt his message was not right for his audience. I did take away some things that I could use in my speeches though. I liked how confident he was, and hope to be able to use that in my speeches. I also thought his volume was good and he seemed very prepared for his speech and also for the audience questions. This is definitely something I want to incorporate into my speaking. 

10/12 performance

a) Danielle McIntyre 10/12/12
b) Collection of Shel Silverstein poems
c) I liked how I was able to not really use my performance aid. I only used it a few times.
d) My peers thought that I could have a more creative introduction. They also thought that I could use transitions between the poems. They thought that I had improved since monday though
e) To improve today I tried to use my book less. I also practiced emotion and eye contact.
f) I think to improve more I could completely eliminate the performance aid and add a more creative introduction and some transitions

10/10 Performance

a)Danielle McIntyre 10/10/12
b) Shel Silverstein Poems
c) I really liked how I was able to use more emotion in these pieces. I also liked the pieces in general which made them more fun to perform.
d) My peers both agreed that I could have a more creative introduction. They also agreed that I could still use a little bit more emotion
e) I tried to use my performance aid less and I also tried to use more emotion
d) I am going to try to use my performace aid even less or not at all. I am also going to work on eye contact. I also think that I could work on using a little bit more emotion. Overall I just need to work on minor details.

Analysis 3

Poem Analysis

Sick by Shel Silverstein

1.  In this poem the narrator is a child. This child feels sympathetic towards themselves. They try to make the interpreter feel sorry for them as well.

2. In this poem the character is fighting to be sick so she doesn’t have to go to school

3. I think before the poem began the character was probably sleeping and hadn’t woken up for the day yet.

4. The humor in this story is at the end when the girl finds out it is Saturday and makes a miraculous recovery.

5. The opposite here would be the young child being so very sick. Most children would never become that ill and although she is faking it could still be an opposite.

6. What makes this different from the past is that it is a Saturday. You can convey this by being very surprised when finding out that it is not a school day.

7. It is simply a humorous and amusing scene

8. The girl is trying to convince everyone how very sick she is so you can show the audience how she is feeling by acting sick, almost in an over exaggerated way like the character seems to be doing. When she says things like her back hurts, make it evident that your back is sore and make sure to point out your chicken pox, and basically just be overly needy.

9. Basically like I said above act out the actions of feeling sick. Don’t be standing super straight or acting like the healthiest person alive until the end of the poem.

10. I imagine the place to be the girls bedroom. Because she would be in bed or just getting out of bed, don’t be moving around the stage a lot.

11. This character is very whiney. I imagine her acting sick in a very over exaggerated way. She may always have her hand to her forehead or on her back to show that she is sick. I also imagine her with a very childish voice.

12. How old is the child supposed to be?

10/5 Performance

a) Danielle McIntyre 10/3/2012
b) The Fearful Animals Adapted by Amy Friedman
c) I liked how I felt more comfortable not using my script as much. I also liked the fact that I had a lot more eye contact.
d) My peers all agreed that I could have a more creative introduction because all i said was the title and the author. They also agreed that I should try to use my script less and use a little more emotion to differentiate characters.
e) I tried to use my script less and have more eye contact. I wish I could have been off script a little bit more though. I also tried to use more emotion.
f) I am going to continue to try to use more emotion and have more eye contact. I am going to work on using a script less.

10/3/2012 Performance

a) Danielle McIntyre 10/3/2012
b) The Fearful Animals Adapted by Amy Friedman
c) I liked how I didn't feel nervous. This is something that is definitley getting better. I also liked how by the second round of performances today I used more emotion.
d) My peers both agreed that I need to use more eye contact. They also said that I could use more emotion in my story and that I need to use my performance aid less. The both thought that it imporved the second round.
e) I tried to use more emotion this time and have more eye contact. I also tried to slow down because I tend to speed up when doing public speaking. I also tried to not use my script as much, but still need to work on that.
f) I want to use my performance aid a lot less and I want to use more emotion

Speech Analysis 1

Danielle McIntyre

Public Speaking

Speech Analysis

A.  The speaker on Thursday September 27, 2012 was Lauri Anderson. Lauri Anderson has done service work in many parts of the world and has written several books.

B. Lauri gave his speech in the Chapel at Iowa Wesleyan College. The chapel was a comfortable temperature and natural light is let in through the windows. The speaker was able to use a microphone, but mostly just talked without one. There wasn’t any background noise or distractions that occurred during the speech. Because of the size of the room the speaker had to project his voice.

C. The speaker’s main points were to inform the students of Iowa Wesleyan about his service and volunteer work around the world. He has traveled all over to help others. He also read excerpts from several of his books. He didn’t necessarily have an argument within his speech; he was just trying to inform about volunteer work.

D. The speaker did well in his ability to speak loudly, but other than that his presentation was fairly weak. Although he could speak loudly it would have been more effective if he had used the microphone. He didn’t have any visual aids, which isn’t necessarily bad, but it could have made it more interesting. I thought the speaker really jumped around between topics. I was very confused as to what he was talking about for a majority of the speech. I also thought that the speaker used a very monotone voice. It seemed as though he wasn’t passionate about what he was talking about. The speaker stayed in one spot for most of the time and didn’t really use any hand gestures. The speaker had some eye contact, but it could have been better. It also seemed like the speaker wasn’t well prepared. Like I said before, he jumped around on topics, and ran out of time at the end. I felt as if this should not have happened.

E. Overall, if I’m being honest, I did not like this speech. The way the speaker jumped around had me very confused and his monotone voice made the speech quite boring. I also felt as if he hadn’t prepared the speech; he just “winged it.” At the end of the speech he had a student argue with him about something he said. Although it was a topic I wasn’t familiar with, it made me feel as if the speaker may have said something that could have been offensive or something that he hadn’t done enough research on. From witnessing this speech I have learned that you should be prepared and your topics should be organized in a way that is easy to understand. I also learned that it is important to know how much time you will have and prepare accordingly. I also learned why it is so important to use emotion when you speak. It makes for a much more interesting and meaningful performance.

10/1/2012 Performance

A)Danielle McIntyre
B) Tell Me A Story Selection: The Fearful Animals
C) I thought I did fairly well not stumbling over the words since it was only the first performance day for this piece
D) My peers said I need to not use my performance aid so much
E) I think that I was less nervous this time and was able to be louder
F) I need to work on using more emotion and having more eye contact.

9/26/12 Performance Analysis

a) Danielle Mcintyre...9/26/2012
b) Tiger Can't Sleep
c) I was able to talk louder than I thought I would, because im normally a quiet person. I tried to not just read off the paper towards the end.
d) My peers both said that I could use a more creative introduction. I need to go slower and use more emotion.
e) This was my first day of speeches
f) I need to go slower and use more emotion