What habits or actions will you take to develop your skill?

By week 6, I want to have improved significantly on speech preparation, delivery and confidence. I also want to improve my confidence when working in group settings.

Habits/Actions:

• Practice speeches beforehand.

• Make a conscious effort to incorporate feedback (e.g. looking up, slowing down).

• Speaking up more in group projects.

How I’ll collect evidence:

• Take photos/screenshots of me working on my Action Project and group stuff.

• Keep short notes/reflections each week on how I felt when I spoke up.

• Record myself doing mirror practice sometimes.

• Save any feedback I get from teachers/peers.

• Add it all into my Padlet so it shows my progress.

What do you want to know from them?

How will you prepare yourself for critical feedback?

How I'll get feedback:

I’ll check in with my buddy every couple of weeks after class or group work. I’ll ask them to watch me when I speak up and then tell me what I did well and what I can improve.

What I want to know:

• Do I look/sound confident when I talk?

• Am I clear and easy to understand?

• Do I join in enough during group stuff?

How I’ll prepare for feedback:
I’ll remind myself it’s not personal, it’s to help me improve. I’ll write down their tips so I don’t forget, and try to use them next time.

Simon Jaramillo

At the start, practising my speeches was not part of my routine, causing me to have trouble looking up while reading the script. I have improved on this by remembering to do rehearsals before speeches.

Key takeaway: fewer pauses and if there are pauses, edit them out or restart.

The most effective part of my strategy was the preparation before speaking. Preparing my speeches has made me feel much more confident and well-spoken. Knowing what I am going to say before I read it helps me look up from my script to make eye contact.

Making a conscious effort in slowing down has helped me, but also comes with other challenges. Sometimes my sudden change of speech speed could seem weird to the audience, also making me feel more anxious.

This term, I've done lots of action project presentations, getting more confident after each one. The first few, I was nervous and spoke way too quickly, but as I did more presentations, I learned to relax, make eye contact and slow down.

In Media Studies, I got to have acting and directing roles in films we made. Acting got me to project my voice and improve my body language, while directing got me to take a leading role and communicate clearly. I had to explain my ideas and guide people in their roles, which made me more comfortable in explaining things to groups of people.

My accountability buddies and family have told me that I speak more confidently and clearly. They also mentioned that I still rush when I'm nervous, so I'm working on that.

Overall, I've improved a lot since the start. I used to get really anxious before publicly speaking, but now ive done multiple presentations, vodcasts and have done acting and directing in media studies. I still don't look forward to speaking publicly or enjoy it, but I've started to dread it less than before.

This goal has let me see that I am much more capable than i previously assumed. I thought that I was a more shy, quiet person, but after doing extra practice and preparation for my presentations and vodcasts, I felt much more confident in doing them. Each time I spoke in front of people, I got more and more comfortable in doing it, and now I feel much less nervous before speaking publicly, partly due to my improved preparation, but also due to my experience and added confidence

When you look across the full 12 (or so) weeks, what patterns can you see in how you approached challenges or responded to feedback?

Across the 12 weeks, I noticed that I generally felt nervous when starting new things, but once I got constructive criticism, I tended to improve. I took feedback seriously and made a conscious effort to slow down and make eye contact, both things which were suggested to me.

How might you use what you’ve learned about your learning processes to approach future unfamiliar or complex tasks more effectively?

I will take this experience into account every time I am preparing for a speech. I will always practice it by myself before I give it, and I will make conscious efforts to slow down and make eye contact. I will always listen closely to feedback and try to implement it into my future public speeches.

"You should speak slower and more clearly" - My Dad

"Too many pauses" - Media teacher

"Slow down" - Group member

All of these helped me improve my presenting skills.

My accountability buddies and family's feedback were quite helpful. They said I appeared confident when I spoke, but I rushed my sentences when I was nervous. That one piece of feedback stayed with me because it encouraged me to slow down and take my time when presenting. That helped me feel calmer and sound more natural.

Throughout the process, I learned other skills such as collaboration, creative thinking, and character. Working with people in the media taught me how to communicate and lead a team. Creating my vodcast increased my creative thinking. And being resilient through all this showed persistence and character growth.