Hear from Science Prof. Gary King
Transcript
One of the best tools I know of to help students grasp good oral communication skills is actually a very easy one to use. Students can be directed to TED talks on specific topics that might be relevant for a particular class. And then they can be asked to prepare a brief summary of the content, after having watched the videos. That is, they can be asked to relate what they learned from the talks and then, in addition, they can be asked to provide a critique of the speaker styles that made the talks work. They not only get to learn about something interesting, in doing that they get to consider for themselves what made the presentation work and then write about it, so they end up basically, improving their own oral and writing skills, by doing something that's actually rather fun in a very easy way.