Speech Writing 101

I remember the first time I was forced to write a speech was in 7th grade. I was running for my class president under the slogan “Filo for the Future”, even though this was 7th grade and nothing I could possibly do under the role would have any impact on anyone’s future. I was told in order to run I had to present a 1 minute speech over the announcements, which at this point I had thought were just beamed across the country like radio. I wrote my speech while watching T.V. show reruns about class elections to get a grasp of what I was supposed to do. The day came to present them and I had the cliché speech of promises about better lunches, longer recesses and a variety of other utter impossibilities that would never be accomplished, but in this particular situation the nonsense worked, as I was elected, and proceeded to make my case for better lunch and longer recess to the principal to no avail.

Since that fateful election I have written more than my fair share of speeches, and I have found that writing your own speech will make you much more successful than having someone else do it. I have learned some major keys to speech writing that have helped me succeed in speaking situations as well as a general formula that I like to use. In this article I will cover the keys to speech writing along with the formula I enjoy using.

Keys to speech writing:

1.No matter what, be YOURSELF

The most important thing to keep in mind when writing a speech is to convey your own personality. You never want to present something that you do not believe in. If you find yourself a humorous person, incorporate some of your humor in your speeches (unless the topic is something serious). When presenting a speech, you always want to feel comfortable, and feel like it is something you would say in an everyday situation.

2.Use different types of evidence to prove your point

A fault that a lot of people make while writing is they use only quotes or only evidence to prove their thesis. At the end of the speech this will leave your audience bored and make your speech repetitive and predictable. Try to vary your evidence between quotes, facts, reasoning, logic, anecdotes, and emotional appeal. This will lead to a much more diverse speech and a less predictable presentation.

3.Stay Within your vocabulary

Where a lot of students falter is when writing a speech they make a decision to use vocabulary larger than they are capable of. One of the worst things for speech presentation is struggling to pronounce certain words. Having large words present in a speech is fine, but if you go too far overboard with them, you may confuse your judges and also struggle through your presentation.

4.Parallels are awesome

Have you ever wondered how people come up with power statements that stick in your minds, and you wish that you could do that? Well parallels can provide that help you have been looking for. Parallels are statements that have more than one item to them and use the same structure. For example, if writing a speech on winning an award you could open with or include the parallel: “I will never forget the sound of applause, I will never forget the uplifting feeling, I will never forget the sight of those I know cheering for me, I will never forget that moment.

The Speech Formula for a Powerful Speech (HTBSE)

The following formula works best when used in more emotional speeches, and if you are doing speeches that are purely or almost purely informative, it is better to use a different format. This formula works based on mostly power statements with information in between. The formula works off of 5 main components, the hook, thesis, body, summary, and ending. Throughout I will give examples with the prompt: “What does community service mean to you?”

H. The Hook

The hook is potentially the most important aspect in deciding how closely your audience pays attention to your speech. The hook is the first 2-3 sentences of your speech and are meant to immediately grasp the attention of your audience. The hook works best when used as a quote, statistic or anecdote or even using a single word. Using these can reflect the mood of your speech and can immediately set you up for success.

Examples with “What does community service mean to you?”:

One Word: “Eyes, I have seen a lot of eyes in my life. The eyes of the weary, of the broken, those who have been battered, beaten down, given up. Then I have seen those same eyes light up to the world, those eyes so long deprived of joy echo out a smile when they realize someone is there to help. Throughout all of the events I have done for community service, seeing those eyes light up is what makes community service meaningful to me.”

Quote: “Winston Churchill once said "We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give." Our lives value is determined by the effect we have on those around us, and if we don’t help others out when they need it, who will help us when we need it? “

T: Thesis

Your thesis statement is the summary statement of your entire speech. The thesis is placed as the last sentence of your introductory paragraph and is the crucial information point of your speech that the rest of your speech will be built upon. Attempt to include three main points that you will cover in the body.

Example:

“Community service has greatly impacted my life by allowing me to see perspective, giving me wholesome experience, and showing me my goal to help solve problems in the world.”

B: Body

Your body represents the bulk of your speech. It represents your evidence and how you support your thesis. It is critical to vary your evidence and keep your body from being too dry. The best structure is a three paragraph body that reflects what you described in your thesis. One of the most important parts of writing a body is to include concise transitions from point to point.

Example Body 1: emotion Body 2: anecdote Body 3: facts:

“Through community service I have been able to learn a great deal about perspective. Sometimes it is important to get outside of our everyday life in order to truly see how the other half lives, and see that there are communities struggling. Outside of the suburban bubble there are families and people who struggle every day to provide themselves and those they love with basic human needs. They struggle to feed their kids, they struggle to provide heat for their home during winter, they struggle with the things we take for granted every day. While doing community service I was able to understand the struggles of the other side, and after learning, assisting with those struggles have changed my life. Learning about those who have less than anything I can imagine has redefined me, and made my life goal seeking to help. While learning these perspectives has been powerful, the experiences themselves have been the true life changers.

   The experiences I have had through helping my community have changed me in so many ways. I remember helping my mother run a Special Olympics in my hometown and seeing the face of a young girl, who has never been given the opportunity to compete, win her first award. I have seen a boy long deprived of athletic competition shine when given the opportunity to show what he has again. I have seen those forgotten and downtrodden made their faces full again when they eat their first full meals in weeks. I will never forget the face of a foster child, as a couple finally adopted him after years and years of waiting. These experiences are what truly make community service matter to me, and have given my life the goal to help them.

   Community service has helped me see my calling is ending these trends. 1/3 children worldwide are never recorded at birth, depriving them of rights. Over 25% of American Veterans end up needing financial support when they come back. The average age of an adopted child is 7.5 years old, leaving them in the foster system without a family, causing irreversible damage to their sense of self-worth and understanding of the world. If just 1 in 500 adults adopted a child, every single child would have a family and a parent. Hearing these statistics makes me want to help their situations, and this want defines what community service means to me.”

S: Summary

The summary basically serves as 4 sentences that summarize everything your speech was about. Restate the thesis with your 1st sentence, then with each additional sentence summarize your other paragraphs.

Example:

“Community service has allowed me to find perspective, have amazing experiences, and pushed me to achieve my goal of helping others.” It has showed me that others live much harder lives than mine. I have been able to help out the world and make lives better. Community service has shown me that helping others is one of the most important things you can do.”

E:End

This is your last couple sentences, make sure this is POWERFUL. End it with a challenge to the audience, a question, a parallel, or just a power statement. It is even better if you can relate it to the hook.

Example:

Because I have seen a lot of eyes, whether it be of a veteran in need of food, a foster child in need of love, or a special education student in need of opportunity. I have learned that regardless of what eyes I am looking into, they could all use a little more light. So use community service, and make the eyes of the forgotten, the hopeless, and the outcasts into the eyes of the remembered, the ambitious, and the included.

Thank you for reading about speech writing and the HTBSE formula. We hope you will keep some of this in mind when writing your next speech.