How to learn to speak competently and express your thoughts convincingly?

If thought is an electric current and our language is a transmitter, then we need strong connecting wires. Without them, thoughts from the brain reach the tongue with interference, and even prepared speech can turn into an incoherent set of words.

There is nothing wrong with this, it just can be harmful in some cases. Any person evaluates your essence, and one of the criteria is the ability to communicate. Why do we need to scare off the “big shot” once again?

Therefore, in order to always be at your best and learn to express your thoughts competently, we will immediately consider 3 areas of development of your speech. We will act comprehensively, because these directions are strongly interconnected.

3 criteria for quality speech:

• Fast formulation of proposals
• Using a variety of words
• Expressiveness and Confidence

What does it mean to speak correctly?

A person who speaks correctly and beautifully stands out from the crowd. Beautiful and correct speech is different:

• Ease, absence of long pauses and hesitations;
• Energy;
• The absence of parasitic words and sounds and profanity;
• Full of meaning;
• Melody and volume.

The ability to speak correctly and beautifully is not an innate ability, but a skill. It can be developed. It is important to approach this consciously and practice regularly.

Features of interlocutors and situations

It is important to learn to speak not only beautifully, but also to take into account the contingent with whom you will have to communicate. For example, when you need to convey your idea to representatives of the intelligentsia, the reasonable use of smart words will be appropriate and will increase the importance of a person in the eyes of his interlocutors.

When abstruse terms are used in dialogue with simpler people, the speaker may be mistaken for a “smart guy.”

Situations are different and this must also be understood if you want to start a dialogue. For example, in a rush situation, when work colleagues have rallied for an important project, you need to speak briefly and only to the point. Even some emotionality is acceptable, as it allows you to quickly establish contact with your interlocutor.

If this is a meeting without a strict time frame, then for the beauty of the speech you can insert relevant arguments based on personal or other people’s experience.

Where to start to learn how to speak correctly and convincingly?

To understand where to start developing speech, you need to determine (on your own or with someone else’s help) the current state of affairs. In other words, identify the strengths and weaknesses of your speech. For convenience, I have created a small template that will help you learn how to speak and express your thoughts competently.

Speech can be analyzed in terms of delivery (how you say it) and content (what you say). In this case, a voice recorder or the help of a person who understands the topic will be useful to you.

Find an example of a speech that you like. This could be someone from your circle, or a public figure. Compare your speech with the speech of this person and highlight what exactly you like.

Summary

1. The main thing is practice. The more you talk, the easier it is to formulate thoughts.
2. Listen more. Take time to think about a powerful speech.
3. Absorb useful information, expand your vocabulary
4. Surround yourself with beautiful speech
5. Be charismatic and give your all in a conversation
6. Don't try to please, you live your life
7. Don't dwell on mistakes; they are forgotten in a minute.

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Innings. Speech and diction training

It is pleasant to listen to a person if he speaks melodiously, loudly and at the same time pronounces all sounds correctly.

How to develop melodic speech

Monotonous speech without pauses and at the same pace will not make you an interesting speaker. Using different intonations, changing tempo and pauses, you can diversify your speech and make it easier for your interlocutors to understand. The same phrase pronounced differently will be perceived differently.

The famous American vocal coach Roger Love claims that on average people use 1.5 tones in their speech. To make speech perceived as melodic, he recommends using at least 8 tones.

In more important places, the tempo of speech can be slowed down, and in order to give the speech an emotional coloring, the tempo can be accelerated. Pauses are needed to place emphasis and give interlocutors time to comprehend what they heard.

To develop melodic speech, you can use chants, which vocalists use to warm up their vocal chords.

In order for you to be able to hold the attention of your interlocutor with your speech, you need to learn how to use intonation correctly. For example, if you use a downward intonation at the end of each sentence, the other person may think that you have finished speaking. To prevent this from happening, instead of intonating down, you can raise your voice up, or stay on the same note.

How to learn to speak louder?

Roger Love advises setting your voice volume as if you were speaking to someone standing behind you.

BUT! If you increase the volume and continue to speak monotonously, it will be perceived as aggression. Perhaps in some cases this technique will be useful, but there is no need to abuse it.

There are exercises that will help you increase the volume of your voice without tearing your vocal cords. From the video you will learn what “voice on support” means and how to use it to sound louder.

How to sound louder. Voice on the support

Exercises for developing speech and diction in adults

Diction is the clear pronunciation of sounds in accordance with the phonetic norms of the language. Expressiveness of diction is an important aspect of the skill of an actor, singer, or performer.

You can determine diction disorders yourself (by recording your voice on a voice recorder), or by contacting a speech therapist. Diction disorders are most often associated with underdevelopment of articulatory muscles. These are the muscles you use when speaking.

There are many exercises for the development of speech and diction in adults, used when pronouncing different sounds. In this article I will list just a few of them:

• Smile so that your teeth are not visible;
• Smile so that your teeth are visible
• Pull your lips out with a tube;
• Move the lips extended like a tube left and right, rotate in a circle;
• Inflate both cheeks, then inflate the cheeks one by one.

Radio host Vera Shakhova shared 6 rules for clear diction:

1. Don't mumble under your breath;
2. When you speak, open your mouth wider;
3. Train your articulator muscles (using the exercises described above);
4. Read aloud;
5. Smile when you talk;
6. Practice tongue twisters.

Vera talks more about each rule in this video:

How to learn to speak correctly and beautifully? 6 rules for clear diction

Breathing exercises for speech and diction

Breathing can be divided into two types:

• Thoracic (the diaphragm is almost not used);
• Abdominal (the diaphragm is activated).

Movement of the diaphragm during breathing
As mentioned above, in order for speech to sound louder, the voice must have “support.” The diaphragm serves as this support. Breathing exercises for speech production are performed in order to switch to the abdominal (diaphragmatic) type of breathing, learn to take a short inhalation and a long exhalation, and learn to distribute this exhalation over the required amount of text. Read more about this type of breathing here.

Alexandra Kazakevich, founder and presenter of the School of Eloquence, suggests performing a set of 10 exercises regularly (every day) to establish speech breathing. It takes 5-7 minutes to complete:

1. Starting position - lying on your back, hand on your stomach to control the movement of the diaphragm. Focus your attention on the solar plexus. Take a smooth breath through your nose. Make sure that when you inhale, only your stomach rises. Hold your breath for a few seconds, then exhale very slowly with the sound “SSSSSS”. Repeat 5 times;
2. Starting position – standing, back straight, shoulders down. Place a lit candle at mouth level. Take a deep breath through your nose so that only your stomach moves. Then exhale slowly with the sound “SSSS”. During exhalation, the flame should not fluctuate. The task is to exhale as long as possible. Make sure that the diaphragm remains in one position as you exhale. The stomach should not retract. Repeat 5 times.
3. Starting position – standing, back straight, shoulders down. Place a lit candle at mouth level. Take an active, deep breath through your nose. Hold your breath for a second, then exhale sharply onto the candle with the sound “HHAA!” The task is to blow out the candle. This way you will learn to control the force of the exhaled air.
4. Starting position – standing, back straight, shoulders down. The mouth is open. Imagine having hot food in your mouth. Inhale and exhale through your mouth, trying to “cool” the food. The inhalation should go into the stomach, not into the chest.
5. Starting position – standing, back straight, shoulders down. Try breathing like a dog in hot weather: open your mouth, stick out your tongue, and quickly inhale and exhale through your mouth.
6. Starting position – standing, back straight, shoulders not moving. Imagine that your hands are frozen. Take a deep breath through your nose (the air goes into your stomach), then “warm up” your hands with your breath. The exhalation should be smooth and slow. You can keep one hand on your stomach to control the movement of your diaphragm. Repeat 5-7 times.
7. Starting position – standing, back straight, arms down. Inhale through your nose (the air goes into your stomach), at the same time raise your arms up, hold your breath for a couple of seconds, then, as you exhale, lower your arms through your sides with the sound “SHSHSHH”. Repeat 5-7 times.
8. Starting position – standing, back straight. Inhale through your nose. Then, leaning forward as if pumping up a tire, exhale with the sound “SSSS”. Return to the starting position. Repeat 10 times.
9. Starting position – standing, back straight, hands on your belt. As you inhale, turn your body to the right, and as you exhale, return to the starting position. Same thing to the left. Repeat 8 times in each direction.
10. Say each stanza of the poem “The House That Jack Built” below in one breath. It may not work the first time, but don't be discouraged. If you do these exercises regularly, you will definitely learn.

This is the house that Jack built.

And this is wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

And this is a cheerful tit bird, Which often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

Here is a cat that scares and catches a tit, Which often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

Here is a dog without a tail, Which tugs a cat by the collar, Which scares and catches a tit, Which often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

And this is a hornless cow, Who gored an old dog without a tail, Who rips a cat by the collar, Who scares and catches a tit, Who often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

And this is an old gray-haired and stern woman, Who milks a hornless cow, Who butted an old dog without a tail, Who rips a cat by the collar, Who scares and catches a tit, Who often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In the house that Jack built.

And this is a lazy and fat shepherd, Who scolds a strict cowshed, Who milks a hornless cow, Who butted an old dog without a tail, Who rips a cat by the collar, Who scares and catches a tit, Who often steals wheat, Which is stored in a dark barn In a house that Jack built it.

Popular mistakes in speech

Common speech errors include:

• "Dress." For some reason, many people “put on” coats and other clothes when talking. While the correct thing to do would be “ put on .” “Dress” is used to mean dressing another person, for example, dressing a child;
• "It's ringing." A cultured person will certainly be offended by the erroneous emphasis in this word. To remember the correct pronunciation of “ringing”, you can use the association with the word “stench”. That is, a complete stench emanates from the “ringing”;
• “What time is it?” There is an erroneous choice of case here. So next time ask passers-by a question like this: “What time is it?”

It turns out that to develop a beautiful speech you will have to make a lot of effort. But people who improve their communication skills notice that at the same time their thinking has improved, they began to solve important problems faster.

Content of speech (what we say)

The ability to speak beautifully alone will not make you an interesting interlocutor. To do this, speech must be filled with meaning. Therefore, along with diction training, you may have to work on:

• Speech literacy and vocabulary expansion;
• Improving the accuracy of expression of thoughts;
• Purity of speech.

How to develop speech literacy and expand your vocabulary?

Competent speech is a habit. You won’t be able to develop it in one day. But if you practice regularly, the results will not be long in coming.

To develop speech literacy and expand your vocabulary:

1. Read books. Different genres;
2. Listen to speakers' presentations. For example, at TED;
3. Use dictionaries to find out the meaning of new words. For example, https://new.gramota.ru/;
4. Write dictations. For example, Total dictation;
5. Ask friends and family to correct mistakes in your speech;
6. Start writing and editing texts. The book “New Rules of Business Correspondence” will help you.

How to express your thoughts more accurately?

Before you speak, you need to understand what exactly you want to say. After all, thoughts in your head are born not in the form of words, but in the form of images. And the more accurately you describe these images in words, the easier it will be for you to convey your thoughts to your interlocutor.

The ability to describe your thoughts in words is also a skill. And its development will also take time. The fastest way to learn is through practice. That's why:

• Communicate more, participate in discussions;
• Learn from other people;
• Read books;
• Start a diary or blog.

Another important rule: learn to listen to other people and understand them. This may require you to work on your emotional intelligence. You can start by taking an emotional intelligence test.

How to get rid of parasitic words and make your speech clear

Parasitic words (“as if”, “in short”, “in general”, “like”, “this is it”, “here”, “so to speak” and others) and involuntary sounds (“umm”, “mmm”, “uh” and others) clog up speech.

Most often, people use filler words and sounds to fill pauses. The speaker pronounces them at the beginning or end of a sentence, or when transitioning from one thought to another.

Several ways to get rid of garbage in speech.

• Record your speech on a voice recorder and determine what filler words and involuntary sounds you insert into your speech;
• Every time you say a filler word or make sounds, clap your hands. This is a great way to see how clogged your speech is;
• Start speaking more slowly and take more pauses. This will give you time to work through what you want to say.

Still, public speaking experts recommend not getting rid of filler words completely, but throwing out about 90%. The rest will be needed for informal conversations.

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What does a beautiful speech consist of?

An experienced speaker pays attention to all aspects of his speech. He perfects the pronunciation of each vowel and consonant sound, carefully studies their combinations, and trains to place accents using intonation.

If you want to understand how to learn to speak beautifully in order to always arouse interest and respect from your interlocutors, first of all start working on such characteristics of your speech as:

1. Literacy
   .
   This is the most important sign of beautiful speech. Phrases should be constructed by correctly arranging and coordinating all the words. The use of colloquialisms, tautologies and filler words is unacceptable (unless this is a quotation or an intentional artistic device).
2. Conciseness
   .
   Many people think that the constant use of complex sentences is an indicator of good command of the Russian language. In practice, simple and concise speech without complex phrases makes a much more pleasant impression.
3. Clear pronunciation
   .
   Any person speaking in public should speak as clearly as possible. This will allow listeners to focus on his speech without being distracted by trying to understand unintelligibly spoken words.
4. Rich vocabulary
   .
   This is the main tool of the speaker, which must be mastered perfectly. If a person does not have enough words to express a thought, it is immediately felt.
5. Expressive intonation
   .
   It is not necessary to complete acting courses, but you need to work on the expressiveness of your speech. Correct intonation allows you to turn a boring and monotonous speech into an interesting and convincing one.

It is necessary to work on each component separately, and also train to use them in combination. Gradually, this skill will become automatic, and you will be able to use it in a live conversation without thinking. Now let's move on to specific recommendations.

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