Public Speaking and Kids

Public speaking is a means through which a person can commune with a large number of people and bear an impact upon the audience. Public speaking skill is an asset. It helps the speaker to express self as well as pursue others. It is an essential part that needs to be invested in to make the communication process across any podium effective and efficient.

Why Public Speaking Skill should be learned?

Public speaking skill should be cultivated from a young age.  It not only helps to boost their confidence and self-esteem but also helps them to one to connect with others. It helps one to take a stand for the right thing and against bullies. By speaking aloud in a confident if not refine manner, one gets acknowledged and a whole new world of opportunities dawns upon him or her. It contributes immensely in improving leadership skills and succeeding in the professional front. 

Importance of public speaking skill for kids

• Most children are shy in nature and often refrain from participating in class because they fear that they will be laughed at or ignored. They abstain from interacting with teachers during class or verbally answering the question despite knowing it because they don't know how to convey it in words. By focusing on inculcating speaking skill at the public podium, we can help them to get rid of tittering nerves and wobbly legs phenomenon.
• It helps children to excel in their academic life. Students are bound to give a presentation at some point or the other. By acquiring public speaking skills, children can present their oral assignment with confidence and clarity.
• It grooms them to become attentive listeners as well since public speaking is about communication which is a two-way process. The child learns the necessity of listening to what others have to say at an early stage, this helps them to refine other sets of skills as debating, socializing, communicating etc.
• Many children while doing exceptionally good in their academic stage, touts and struggle in their later life in their professional zone because of their inability to relay their idea or assert themselves in critical junctures. By allowing your children to develop public speaking skills, you empower your child to graft a successful career and happy life.

Watch | Importance Of Communication Skills For Children

How to teach public speaking skills to children?

As a parent, you have a pivotal role to play in nurturing your children abilities. Public Speaking skill is another life skill that you ought to teach your child.

Here is how you can achieve it

• The very term public speaking evokes repulsion from people and it fares no good with children as well. Before doing anything try to ingrain in their mind its positive aspects. Appeal to them in a manner that they find the art of speaking tempting, like allowing them to speak about their favourite toy, food or book in a family gathering. Make sure to not push them aggressively into action.
• Make them read and recite aloud. Encourage them to indulge in oral storytelling. Join them in these endeavours. By doing so you are not only sowing seeds of creativity but also edging them to express themselves.
• Working on vocals is also important. A speech is effective if its content is conveyed in a clear and clairvoyant manner. To help them in this regard you can take help of online tutorial which teaches how to improvise voice quality through exercises.
• Teach them about voice manipulation, which is an important skill to pick on to become a good orator. You can do so, by reading a passage in different pace or inhibiting the role of characters while telling a story. Voice intonation and modulation should be appropriated by every speaker since these are the only means through which audience attention could be retained amidst speech.
• Teach them about body language, hand gestures and eye contact. These three things in addition to content and quality of speech are very important for delivering a speech. One cannot forgo attaining lessons in them. Initially teach them tricks as finding blind spots in a crowd, making use of the palm of hand etc while presenting themselves to the audience. Once they get in the habit of interacting with a large crowd, they can pick up the aforementioned mannerism in no time with your help.
• Give them fun exercises to perform which shall assist them in building their public speaking skills. Assign them interesting topics for a symposium, debate with them; ask them to share their opinion about certain adult topics as need of education, the importance of health, proper nutrition. By doing so you are displaying confidence in your children and this, in turn, shall fuel their zeal to improve their skill.
• Encourage them to read a wide variety of books on different topics. This shall help them to grasp knowledge on a wide variety of subjects and enrich their vocabulary. In addition to it, it will also assist them greatly in delivering good content.

Lastly, appreciate their efforts, this, in turn, shall stimulate in them the desire to share their creation with others and make their voices heard by people. Public speaking skill can be wielded as a powerful cheat weapon to advance in life. By attaining command over it, children acquire the flair to counter any tricky situation in future by wielding the power of the word.