Lesson video

Hello, and thank you for joining me today.

Mrs. Butterworth here, and I hope you are ready for today's English lesson.

I know I am because today, we are focusing on our spoken language skills.

Now, I know for many of you, spoken language or public speaking can feel really nerve wracking, which is why this lesson is going to be really useful 'cause it's all about building confidence in public speaking.

So, we're going to be thinking about what nerves are, how they feel, and how we can adopt some strategies to really help manage them.

Sound good? Great.

Well, let's get started.

So in this lesson, you'll use body language and posture to manage your nerves and speak confidently in public.

Now before we think about beginning the main part of the lesson, let's look at some key words that will help with our understanding.

These words are testimonial, posture, oriented, and eradicate.

Now, a testimonial is like a statement or a personal account.

So usually someone will share their experience or opinion, so a testimonial.

Your posture is the way you hold your body when standing, sitting, or moving.

And we're gonna think about how we can really use our posture to help manage nerves and really help us feel a bit more confident in our public speaking.

Oriented is about where you are positioned or directed.

So, it's oriented as being positioned or directed towards a particular point.

And to eradicate something means to completely eliminate or remove something.

So, the outline of our lesson looks like this.

We're going to begin by thinking about our body language and posture, and then we're going to move on to think about how we can manage nerves effectively.

So first, I want us to think about public speaking and nervousness.

So, what makes people nervous about public speaking? So, pause the video so you can discuss this question.

You may wish to discuss some of your own experiences as well here.

So, pause the video and off you go.

Okay, great.

It's so important that we share our feelings about public speaking and our own experiences, because I think you'll start to realise that lots of people feel the same way about it.

So, we actually have some pupil testimonials here and as I'm reading these, I just want you to quietly think to yourself are there any that you can relate to specifically? So Lucas says, "I'm scared of messing up my words.

My handshake, and I get a huge knot in my stomach before I speak." Izzy has said, "My mind goes blank when I'm up there, and I feel like everyone's just staring." Sofia, "I'm terrified of being judged.

I worry people will laugh or talk about me if I make a mistake." And Jen, "Once I started practising more, public speaking became less scary.

I feel more confident, and it's kind of fun and gives me a chance to say my views." So, it's really lovely to hear that Jen feels a lot more confident through practising the public speaking.

But all of these I think are so relatable, aren't they? I mean I have loads of public speaking experience and even I know what that knot in the stomach feels like or that worry about getting things wrong or being judged.

So, it's important that we acknowledge these and think about how we can master them, how we can get over them to feel more confident in public speaking.

Like I keep saying, most people feel nervous when public speaking.

Even the most established public speakers that we see on our TVs or in our schools still feel nervous.

And it does get, it is something that gets easier with practise and there are strategies that can help manage nerves.

And it's important to remember that public speaking can be such a great achievement and is a really important skill to have.

And when completed, you should and I think you will feel incredibly proud.

So as I said, we're gonna think about using open body language and an effective posture.

So, you can use these before and during your presentation, and this is what those can look like.

So, you want to think about standing tall or positioning yourself upright.

So, think about doing it now.

Keeping your back straight, your shoulders relaxed, and your feet shoulder width apart.

It can really help you just to feel a bit more secure.

You also want to face the audience, okay? When you're nervous, it can sometimes, you can sometimes feel tempted to move away, but make sure your body is oriented towards the audience, showing openness and engagement.

Make sure that your arms are uncrossed, okay? I know it can feel like you want to protect yourself by crossing your arms, but keep them uncrossed and relaxed by your side or use them, you may want to use them naturally for gestures.

Because actually crossing them can seem closed off and can make speaking more difficult.

You can actually restrict the volume and clarity of your voice by crossing your arms. And again, eye contact.

Make regular eye contact with different parts of the audience to create connection and engagement.

You don't have to find one person and just stare at them.

You can glance generally across your audience to maintain that eye contact.

Okay, question time.

Which of the following may not be considered open body language or an infective posture? Come up with your answer now.

Okay, so who thinks I've got it right? Oh, lots of you.

Great.

Crossed arms absolutely would not be considered open body language.

I mean even the word itself crossed, you can see it's closing yourself off.

Okay, we have some images here of the same person delivering a speech.

I'd like you to discuss please, looking at these images, can you identify the different uses of body language and posture? Which image seems the most confident? So, pause the video so you can discuss your answers and really look at these images and think about how that confidence is being created.

Pause the video and get going.

Okay, so you may have considered the following.

Eye contact.

So in this image here, you can see that the eye contact is looking directly out.

The eyes are open.

They're wide.

You can see them looking out.

You can see that this person is standing upright.

I should say this person me is standing upright and shoulders are relaxed.

You can see they're really open there.

The body is oriented towards the audience.

They're facing straight on.

And the arms are relaxed by the side and you can see the hands are moving there, making some natural gestures as this presentation is being given.

Now the other image, you can see that the eyes are looking down at the floor and the head is down.

So, it's important with this to remember that if you are doing that, your voice is gonna go to the floor as well.

So if you are looking down and your head is down, it's going to really make your voice difficult to hear.

You're not going to be able to project as well.

The body is slouched and the arms are crossed.

So, that slouching of the body and the arms crossed really kind of closes you off to the audience.

It almost looks like you don't really want to be there as well.

So, making sure those arms are open and you've got that open body language just really helps to create that rapport with the audience and keep them engaged.

And you can see that the body is slightly turned away from the audience.

Again, sort of suggesting I don't want to be here or I'm, you know, and that's quite difficult for the audience to engage with if you're talking and your body is turned away.

So overall, this image shows openness and engagement.

They seem more confident.

And in this image, they almost seem fed up and their body language is closed.

And I think it's important to acknowledge that when you feel nervous, it can be so easy to hunch and close off your body language.

It's almost like that's what you feel like you should do.

But actually, taking control of this and adjusting this can really help to manage nerves.

True or false time.

Crossing your arms when nervous will convey confidence when public speaking.

Is that true or false? Tell me your answer now, please.

Well done to everyone that said false.

I now need to hear why the answer is false and a justification for your answer.

Come up with that now please.

Okay, so hopefully, you came up with something similar that crossing your arms can make you seem closed off and can also make speaking more difficult.

Okay, so this is something I like doing.

So, I'd like you to discuss this.

I've got some images here to help.

Have you noticed how superheroes stand? Can you describe it? Pause video, use the images to help you, and discuss those questions, please.

Off you go.

Excellent, thank you.

I'm sure some of you are wondering what superheroes have to do with spoken language.

Well, we are thinking about how they stand because you may have said the following, "They always stand most of the time upright." You can see here in these images they have their feet apart, their head up looking straight ahead and hands on hips like this.

And it already conveys this sense of strength and confidence, this unwavering confidence in fact.

So, this superhero stance is a really interesting thing to think about, because it's something I like to do as well.

Like you can adopt this superhero or you can call it a power stance before you begin speaking.

So, it can help to set your posture and give you a sense of confidence.

Why don't you try it now? Even here, just sat here, I can put my hands on my hips, lift my head up.

And even sitting, I can feel more confident.

Have a go now.

Okay, so we are at our first practise task.

What I would like you to do please is I would like you to watch the video of the posture and body language demonstration.

So, I'll press play on that in a moment.

There is also a transcript available on the worksheet, so you may want to use that as well.

And then, what I would like you to do once you have watched the video is to summarise into five top tips for effective body language and posture.

And then, I would like you to have a go at setting your posture.

At this point, you don't have to speak, but just try and see how different postures and body language make you feel, okay? So, it is important that you watch the video and use that transcript, then summarise into five top tips and then have a go at setting your posture.

So, I'm going to press play now.

In this lesson, we've been thinking about body language and posture and how these can really help you to deliver effectively in public speaking.

So whether that's a presentation or a speech, body language and posture can really help you.

And not only that can they help with nerves and helping you to feel more confident, but if you look more confident and relaxed, your audience are gonna feel more connected to.

They're gonna feel more comfortable listening to you speak.

So, let's think about this.

So before you even begin to speak, you want to think about your posture.

And I call this setting your posture.

So before you speak, you want to set your posture and I'm gonna show you what that looks like now.

And we're gonna start from the feet and work all the way up, okay? So, I always start by making sure my feet are planted firmly on the ground.

So, you can see my feet are slightly apart.

And what this does is it helps you to feel really secure and really grounded.

and it's gonna stop you moving around or feeling insecure.

Just by having your feet grounded can make you feel much more secure and ready to go.

And again, if you're moving around too much, that's gonna be really distracting for your audience.

So, you wanna be grounded and secure.

Now you may notice as well, my arms are nice and relaxed beside me.

When you are delivering a presentation or public speaking, it can be so tempting to cross your arms or put your hands in your pockets or your hands on your hips, but straight away, you can see my whole posture changes and I no longer look confident and relaxed.

So just relaxing your arms by your side can help you look much more open, much more relaxed.

And also as you are speaking, it's gonna be easier to add in some gestures if that's what you would like to do.

So, we've got our feet grounded and our arms relaxed.

Now, the next thing I want you to think about are your shoulders.

Now, something I always do before I start speaking is I roll my shoulders back, okay? Not only does it feel really nice, but you can see it creates openness here, which makes you feel much more confident.

You look more confident.

And again, it's that open body language that just signals to the audience I'm here.

I'm confident and I'm ready to talk to you.

So, you can see how rolling the shoulders back, my arms relaxed, my feet planted.

I'm really open.

I look much more confident.

And actually, it's making it much easier to talk and I feel more confident.

And as you do that, you also want to consider your head as well.

And I tilt my head slightly up, okay? Once I've rolled my shoulders, I tilt my head slightly up.

And again, not only does this help create that openness, but it really helps with your voice projection.

So, actually you end up projecting your voice with very little effort, because once you've opened up your chest and lifted your head, you can really, you can hear already just in my voice, can't you? How that just really opens you up and makes it easier to project your voice.

Now a little top tip, and this is just something I like to do and is a little bit of fun, is what I call the power stance or the superhero stance.

So before I'm giving a presentation or public speaking, I can sometimes get really nervous.

So, what I do is whilst I'm planting my feet and getting ready, put my hands on my hips and I take my power stance.

And I just take a few breaths, (breaths heavily) which really helps me to feel powerful and in control.

And then when I'm ready, I can relax my arms and begin my speech.

So, I really hope you give this a try because I promise you it can just really help you to feel really secure, really grounded, and much more confident and ready to present.

Because actually just taking those few moments before you start to speak can really help to slow you down and just make you feel much more relaxed.

And you look much more open and much more confident, so your audience are much likely, much more likely to feel connected to you.

Great work, everyone.

Thank you so much for your efforts and for trying that.

So, I'm going to share some top tips.

So, you may have something similar you may wish to add to your answers.

So, your top tips may include setting your posture before you begin speaking can help you feel more secure and less nervous.

Trying a superhero stance can make you feel ready to present.

Planting your feet into the ground and slightly apart can give you a good foundation to deliver.

Keeping your arms relax.

Keep your arms relaxed by your side.

And rolling your shoulders up and back and raising your head slightly can create open body language and help to project your voice.

I have to keep reminding myself of that one about rolling my shoulders back and my head up.

And then, what I would like you to do, please, is I'd like you to just spend some time thinking about how you felt after setting your posture.

Now, I know with like the superhero stance and doing this, you can feel a little bit awkward and a bit silly, but it's about, oh, this helps you to overcome those feelings, okay? So, it's really important we give this a go.

So, you think about how you feel after setting your posture and then complete the reflection sentence.

Setting my posture was effective because.

For future public speaking I will consider.

Okay, so pause the video and complete those reflection sentences.

Off you go.

Okay, fantastic work everyone.

Hopefully, your posture is set and you are already feeling more confident and ready to continue.

So now, we're gonna really think about how we can manage nerves.

So, we know, I've said it already this lesson and we know anyway, don't we, that public speaking can be a nerve wracking thing.

I know I keep saying this, but it's so true that even the most experienced public speakers will feel nervous.

And I think as well, it's important to understand that managing nerves is not about eradicating them completely.

So it's not about getting rid of nerves completely, but understanding how we can master them 'cause as I say, I don't think there's anyone that or there's very few people that would public speak without feeling a little bit nervous.

So, our aim isn't to get rid of them completely, but to manage them.

So, I want you to think about this, please.

In what ways do nervousness and excitement affect our bodies in the same way? Do they feel similar? So, pause the video so you can discuss in what ways do nervousness and excitement affect our bodies in the same way and do they feel similar.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with, so pause the video and get discussing.

Okay, it's interesting, isn't it, when you start thinking about this idea of excitement and nervousness.

So, let's just share some of these similarities.

So both excitement and nervousness can, so you may have picked up on the idea that they increase the heart rate and trigger a faster heartbeat.

So, both nerves and excitement do this.

They both release adrenaline, heightening alertness and readiness.

They can, in quite extreme cases, cause shaking, trembling, or jitteriness when energy is released.

So, excitement and nervousness can do this.

And they can create breathing changes, so they can create quite a shallow or rapid breathing.

And that's a really common reaction to both excitement and nervousness.

I mean, I think about, if you think about going on a rollercoaster, it can be both exciting and scary, can't it? So again, we get both of these reactions happening.

So, think about these ideas again and I'd like you to discuss, could any of these sensations possibly be considered useful for public speaking? So read those points again, those sensations, and consider if they could be useful for public speaking.

Pause video to come up with your answers.

Off you go.

Okay, great.

So, you may have considered the following.

So, this idea of adrenaline release, heightening alertness and readiness.

Thought actually being alert and ready could help you focus.

So, it could help you respond quickly and adapt the situation.

So, actually that adrenaline can be really useful.

And also that extra energy that can be released can really increase the enthusiasm that you have, creating a more engaging and dynamic delivery.

So actually using those feelings of jitteriness and that released adrenaline can actually make your presentation even more engaging.

So, true or false time.

Nerves and excitement are completely different feelings.

Is that true or false? Tell me your answer now, please.

Okay, well done to everyone that said false, but I would like you to tell me why that is false.

So, come up with your answer now.

So hopefully, you have something like nervousness and excitement share similar sensations, like a faster heartbeat, breathing changes, and jitteriness.

So that is why that answer is false, because actually they are quite similar.

So I'm gonna say it, public speaking can be exciting.

So one of the things I promise you, one of the things you can think about is reframing your nervousness as excitement.

And by doing this, reframing your nervousness as excitement, it can really help it to feel less daunting.

So for example, instead of saying, "I'm feeling nervous about," we could try, "I am excited about." And those simple switches can almost kind of trick you into feeling a lot more positive about public speaking.

So, let's look at some of our Oak pupils here.

This is how they reframed their nerves.

So Jun now said, "I am feeling excited about sharing my views on climate change.

It's an important issue and I want to make my voice heard." Absolutely, Jun, great response.

And Sofia said, "I'm excited to have a go.

I have found public speaking tricky, but really want to try.

Even delivering a short presentation will make me feel proud." What a fantastic response there for Sofia.

I think that's great.

I'm excited just to have a go.

And I think that's a really excellent way to put it.

It's not just that I'm nervous, it's that she's excited.

She's gonna have a go even if it's a short presentation.

And I think that's a really, really great example of reframing our nerves as excitement and as a more positive thing.

So, I'd like you now to complete your own reframing sentence.

So you can use these sentence starters to help you.

I'm feeling excited about.

I am excited too.

So, pause a video to give yourself time to do that.

Off you go.

Okay, so are we feeling excited? Are we feeling more confident? I really, really hope so.

So, the other thing that we can try as well to manage nerves is to think about our breath, okay? Box breathing or square breathing is a useful strategy used by many different people from athletes to politicians, to singers, actors.

Lots of different types of people use box breathing or square breathing.

And what this means, and the reason it's called box or square breathing, is because it incorporates four equal phases.

So, you inhale for four seconds, hold for four seconds, exhale for four seconds, and then hold for four seconds.

So, you can see that box or square breathing coming through because of all the fours.

So, you can then repeat the cycle as needed.

Should we try it now and see how it goes? So, let's try it.

I'm gonna get ready.

Okay, so try it with me.

So we're gonna inhale for four.

(breaths heavily) Hold for four.

Exhale for four.

(breaths heavily) And hold for four.

How do you feel? I feel much more relaxed.

Why don't you pause a video and have a go yourself now.

Off you go.

Okay, I feel much more relaxed after all that lovely breathing.

So, what I would like you to do now is I would like you to present for one minute, just one minute.

So, it doesn't have to be your whole presentation.

It can be on a topic of your choice or you can use the following sentence data.

My favourite X is Y because dot, dot, dot, dot, dot.

So, this isn't about presenting the most perfect presentation.

It's just about getting used to speaking and also to make sure that you are considering your posture and your body language.

You're thinking about that reframing, I'm excited to, and your breath, okay? So, it's just putting all of these things into practise.

So remember, the aim is not to say every word or sentence perfectly and without mistakes.

That isn't the aim.

It's about expressing yourself clearly and confidently, getting used to speaking and getting used to what that body language, posture, breath, all of those things, how all of those things feel.

And I'm gonna say it one more time, practise does really make perfect.

So, pause the video to get this task completed and I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

Off you go.

Fantastic work everyone, well done.

And thank you so much for giving that a go.

I really do hope that you're starting to see how posture, body language, that breathing, thinking about being excited instead of nervous can just really help you to feel confident.

And I promise you, the more you practise, they will just start to come more naturally to you, okay? So, really well done.

So, the first thing I want to do for some feedback is just discuss the following reflection question.

So, you were asked to present for one minute, how was your timing? Did you speak for less than a minute or more, okay? Pause the video so you can discuss that question.

Okay, that's really interesting, isn't it? Because the reason I ask that is because practising timings is also an important part of public speaking preparation, because actually it's important to understand what it feels like to speak for a minute or five minutes because until you start practising , it's very difficult to gauge.

So, practising timings and understanding what those timings feel like is an important part of public speaking.

So, I'd like you to try delivering your presentation again, getting as close to a minute as you can.

Pause the video to have a go at this.

Okay, great.

You see what I mean? It can be really different can't it? Speaking for one minute and really thinking about what that feels like.

I always think I speak much quicker than I think, so it's good to think about that.

So final reflection task, please.

I would like you to self-assess your presentation, giving yourself a what went well and an even better if.

So, you may want to consider your use of posture and body language, how you managed your nerves and your timings.

So, pause the video to give yourself that WWW, what went well, and your even better if, your EBI.

Off you go.

And a very well done, everyone.

We have reached the end of the lesson and I hope you are feeling really proud of yourselves for having a go at public speaking, because we now know that feeling scared and nervous about public speaking is a shared concern.

We know that open body language and an effective posture can help to manage these nerves.

Setting your posture before you speak is a good way to prepare and can help you to control your voice and your body.

Nervousness and excitement share similar traits, I promise.

And breathing exercise can help alleviate the physical side of nerves.

So, that lovely box of square breathing can really help.

So, I think I'm gonna go and do some of that breathing myself now.

So, I hope to see you all again very soon in another English lesson.

I look forward to it.

Goodbye.