White brunette female holding paper practicing speech in front of mirror

5 Effective Tips to Improve Your Public Speaking Skills

Public speaking is a nerve-wracking experience for many students. Conquer your fear and improve your speeches and presentations with these tips!

Public speaking is a valuable skill for students and graduates to have, regardless of your chosen path in life. In the future, you may find yourself in a position to pitch your ideas to a board of superiors, present a case in a courtroom full of jurors, or give a speech about your latest scientific discovery. And you probably won’t be able to avoid giving presentations and speeches in some of your high school and college classes. As important as public speaking is, many people find it to be a nerve-wracking task. If you struggle with public speaking, here are some tips to help you keep calm and ace your articulation.

1. Be prepared

Knowing your topic inside and out is one of the most important factors when it comes to public speaking. If you have the opportunity, choose a topic that you’re already knowledgeable and passionate about. During the research process, keep your ideas organized so it’ll be easy to reference back to them later. Once you have a solid outline of the main points you want to touch upon, practice your presentation in front of your family and friends. Rehearsing with a timer can also help ensure your speaking pace is appropriate for your allotted time limit.

2. Use flashcards

Though it may be tempting to bring along a full essay for your presentation, this will likely not be the best choice. Reading from a lengthy paper makes it easier to lose your spot, which could result in long pauses as you attempt to find your footing again. You may also find yourself holding the paper in front of your face, obstructing both the audience’s view of you and your voice’s projection. Instead, make flashcards using keywords for the main points of your presentation. That way, you can glance at the cards to jog your memory and keep speaking smoothly.

Related: Top Tips for Writing a Graduation Speech

3. Know the environment

If you have the opportunity to visit the space you’ll be presenting in beforehand, this could be a great way to familiarize yourself with the environment and make it seem a little less daunting. You could even practice walking around the “stage” (or whatever space is available to you). You should also have an idea of who will be in attendance during your speech or presentation; will the audience be mostly students your age or a group of senior citizens? Will they share the same beliefs of you, or will you be exposing them to a new point of view? Knowing this information will help eliminate any last-minute surprises for the big day.

4. Get a good night’s sleep

The night before your presentation, you may feel tempted to stay up late and rehearse, but don’t give in! Believe me—giving your brain and body a full night to rest and reset will ultimately benefit you more than going over your notes again. At this point, it’s likely you’ve read and rehearsed your presentation enough that continuing to practice would be more overkill than progress. Get to sleep early so you can wake up as refreshed as possible; any last-minute tweaks you need to make will still be there in the morning.

5. Be present

Eye contact is key! During your presentation, be sure to engage with and look at your audience rather than your notes. If it helps, you can even ask someone you know to sit in the audience so you can single out a familiar face and pretend you’re speaking directly to them. Before the big day, you may want to practice speaking with a light, conversational tone, as the audience is more likely to connect with you if you don’t sound robotic. Also consider working a joke into the beginning of your presentation to help ease the tension (as long as it works with the tone of the assignment).

Related: 5 Common Interview Body Language Mistakes to Avoid

Public speaking can be daunting, but the benefits are exponential. With these tips, you’ll be presenting with ease in no time. Take a deep breath, smile, and go share your knowledge with the world!

Make your school life a little easier with the helpful articles and advice in our Majors and Academics section.

Like what you’re reading?

Join the CollegeXpress community! Create a free account and we’ll notify you about new articles, scholarship deadlines, and more.

Join Now

Tags:

About Hailey Myers

Hailey Myers is a homeschooled high school student from California. She's been drawn to literature and creative activities from a young age and is ecstatic to share what she knows with fellow students. 

 

Join our community of
over 5 million students!

CollegeXpress has everything you need to simplify your college search, get connected to schools, and find your perfect fit.

Join CollegeXpress
Wendy Thompson

Wendy Thompson

Owner, Westport Educational Consulting

I just discovered your site and LOVE it—fun, interesting, full of incredible information you can’t find anywhere else, and a godsend for those of us in the college counseling business. I am a fan!

Hannah Nelsen

Hannah Nelsen

High School Class of 2022

CollegeXpress has helped me look at colleges that fit my interests by taking my profile and matching it to colleges that have the programs I'm looking for. It has the ability to connect me to colleges so I can be contacted by them and look at them more in-depth to find what's right for me. Additionally, the scholarship database is super beneficial for getting scholarships for college. Not only does it help lift the financial burden of college but it shows all the opportunities available. Overall, CollegeXpress has been very helpful to me.

Brooke Maggio

Brooke Maggio

High School Class of 2021

CollegeXpress has helped me tremendously in my college search in narrowing down the schools I’m interested in. Using the college search tool, I was able to narrow down my choices to schools that matched what I was looking for. I also used CollegeXpress for their scholarship search, which helped me find scholarships that I meet the requirements of.

Sonny Harris

Sonny Harris

College Student

For the entire year before college, I spent a lot of time deeply considering what major I wanted to go into and how to fund my higher education. After a lot of research, I came across CollegeXpress, which helped me ultimately find a ton of scholarships for which I could apply—and some of which I received! If it weren’t for CollegeXpress, I may not have found those scholarships as they didn't appear on any other scholarship search forum. Additionally, I learned more about the options I had been considering for my major through CollegeXpress’s resources. In the end, I chose to major in Computer Science, as it seemed best suited to me and the careers in the field seemed enjoyable, and I've never been more excited to move into my future! Ultimately, I want to thank CollegeXpress for offering their services. I received enough financial aid in scholarships to fund my entire freshman year of college and even got some money refunded which I used to purchase a new laptop, and I bought all of the books I needed for the semester!

Monica

Monica

High School Class of 2023

Being a sophomore in high school, I never really worried about college. I thought it wasn't important to worry about until senior year. Through this program opportunity I came across, I realized how important it is to start looking at colleges early and start planning ahead. CollegeXpress has opened my eyes to what colleges require, what colleges are near me, and what they offer. The daily emails I get from CollegeXpress really help me look at the different options I have and what colleges I fit into. Without this website, I would not be taking the time out of my day to worry about what my future will be nor what opportunities I have. I could not be more grateful for such an amazing and useful website. It's thanks to CollegeXpress that not only me but my family now know how much potential I have in to getting into these colleges/universities that we thought were out of my reach.

College Matches
X

Colleges You May Be Interested In

University of San Francisco

San Francisco, CA

Washington College

Chestertown, MD