Pixar Reflection Paper

As someone who suffers from severe anxiety in situations like public speaking, I was very nervous about my first attempt in doing so. I tried to practice my speech without writing it out word for word, thinking this would help prevent it from being robotic and overly stylized. I think that part of this goal was achieved. However, while I was pleased with the central idea of my Pixar personal speech being relatively clear, after watching my video there were a few things that stood out as need some improvement. Within the first few seconds of watching my video, what struck me was my clothing and my posture, both of which were in slight disarray. Wearing a collared shirt can add a sense of professionalism to a speaker - however if the collar

My tone was not robotic, and I believe I spoke clearly and was heard everyone in the room. Having the outline in front of me was helpful in that I was able to keep track of where I was, and remember what my next point would be. However, looking at the video I can see that having my outline on a single sheet of paper was a poor choice. Having such a prop was only fodder for my nervousness, and I fidgeted quite frequently with the paper. Moving and waving it around in front of me was distracting on the video, and I can only imagine it was the same to the audience. While my use of poor transition words like “um” were not as bad as I was expecting, I did use them frequently enough to be noticeable when I viewed the video of myself. I also didn’t make as strong a use of eye contract as I initially thought. Using a stronger vocabulary coupled with a stronger personal presence is really something that I need to continue to work on. I would like to complete a speech without relying on hesitant transitions and looking down. On a more positive note, I do think that my use of hand gestures and the attempt of humor in my speech helped make my story more