Course Information Handout

Course Learning Objectives

This course will (1) encourage you to think about effective public speaking, and (2) equip you with the basic speaking skills that they will need in their other coursework at MIT. We will provide you with opportunities to practice your skills and create mechanisms for feedback to help you strengthen them.

Upon completion of the course, students will have learned how to:

• structure a speech,
• deliver a speech,
• give a group presentation with basic slides, and
• speak in an impromptu fashion.

Given the short amount of time we have together, you won't necessarily "present like Steve Jobs" at the end of the course, but you will be equipped with the basic oral communication skills that you'll be able to (1) use in the speaking assignments that you'll encounter as part of your coursework/internships, and (2) build upon in the various CI-H and CI-M courses at MIT.

Course Format

The course consists of 7 class sessions, 6 individual tutorials and various assignments.

Class sessions are on Wednesdays from 7-10pm. During this time, there are short lectures, demonstrations, impromptu activities and small group practice sessions led by a tutor.

Every student will do one impromptu activity in class sometime during the course. (They are fun!)

Every week, students work on some assignment, and are expected to meet with their tutor for 15 minute session to go over what they have done for the assignment. Tutorials times are scheduled with the tutor. During this time, the students gives a dryrun of the speech they have prepared and practiced beforehand. Students receive tutorial credit if they come prepared; else no tutorial credit is awarded.

Assignments for this course are primarily oral in nature, with one short paper due at the end of the course. Oral assignments consists of three speeches (one of which must be revised), and one group presentation. Students prepare and practice these outside of class, do a dryrun for their tutor during tutorial, and then give the speech/talk in front of their small group during a small group practice session. The written assignment is a short paper about what you've learned and how you've progressed/improved as evidenced by self-perception, others' perceptions and videos of your various speaking opportunities. All assignments must be completed to pass the course.

Be forewarned that this course can be a lot of work for some students -- particularly if writing/presenting is not your forte.

Course Expectations

You are expected to conduct yourself in a manner that is professional and to manage your time accordingly. This means, for example, arriving to class and tutorial session on-time and prepared.

As you will all be learning from each other, you are also expected to provide your fellow students with clear, respectful, honest, concrete and sensitive feedback.

Please refrain from using your laptop, cell phones, ipods, smart phones, electronic gadgets, etc. during class. It is distracting.

There is no required textbook.

There are only seven class meetings for this course, and each meeting involves hands-on work, so we expect you to come to class, pay attention and participate. Attention is especially important for a class of this nature; unlike other technical classes at MIT, you cannot simply learn the material from reading a textbook and completing the assignments alone.

Absences can only be excused by a note from the Counseling Deans(S^3). Help the teaching staff minimize surprises by emailing your tutor when you are absent, ideally beforehand if you know about it ahead of time, otherwise we worry about you. Your attendance record is available online for you to check.

All students have the potential to get an A in the course; however, we have high standards. In the interest of fairness, all students are given the same opportunity to excel, and all students are graded based on the same criteria.

The weighing of assignments is as follows:

Written Assignments:                               	
     Reflections		15%
     Online Final Assessment	 5%

Oral Assignments:						
     Narrative  Speech		15%
     Informative Speech         15%
     Persuasive Speech          15%
     Group Presentation         20%

Miscellaneous:
     Tutorial Grade		15%

Note:

• All assignments must be completed to pass the course.
• There is a mandatory revision of one of the speeches.
• Late work will be accepted and graded, but there will be a penalty for lateness.
• Requests for regrades must be submitted in writing to your recitation instructor. Please state the nature of the complaint and why the grade awarded should be otherwise. The paper/speech/talk will be re-evaluated in its entirety.

Each assignment will receive a grade from 0-4. At the end of the term, a weighted raw score is computed based upon the scores you received on your assignments. This raw score is a indicator of the quality of your written and oral work, and it serves as a basis for determining your final grade.

Other factors that may both positively and negatively affect your grade, particularly for borderline cases include:

number of recovered absences, participation,  punctuality, responsibility, attitude, 
professional conduct, ability to follow directions, creativity in assignments, improvement and effort.

Note that the teaching staff further reserves the right to grade on a curve and to make adjustments for special cases.

Requests for Final Grade Re-evaluation

To get started with the semester, read this handout, and register for an online account at the course website (which has yet to be constructed). You will be asked to pick a username, and you will also need to complete an initial self-assessment that take less than 20 minutes.

Have a good semester!