Week 9 - Reflection

I believe that my understanding of speaking and scripting has improved dramatically through the completion of the assessment piece. The various audio and visual recordings included in this blog are a testament to that. Going into this course, my experience was definitely limited in regards to script writing and this assessment task has certainly worked to broaden that experience.

I have found the exercise of blogging every week to be an extremely useful learning task. Breaking down the week's study module each week into practical exercises in the form of a workbook, helped me to better retain the information each week. I also found it very useful that the tasks for the submission of Assignment 2 were included in workbook exercises. The PAIBOC exercise was extremely useful in mapping out Assignment 2 and the script writing tasks included in Week 8 and 9 helped to instill in me a high level of confidence going into the final assessment task.

The other exercises that I found to be most useful to my learning experience were the ones in which I reviewed and reflected on my own performance. These included the piece to camera exercise from Week 7 and the collection of voice recordings that were completed across the task. I had always thought myself to be quite a strong public speaker and I found it very interesting to see how that actually translated onto film and audio footage.

I have also enjoyed reviewing the academic articles assigned throughout this task and learning how speeches work on a number of different levels. While it is universally understood that having good content and a capable speaker are the basis for producing a good speech, it was extremely useful to learn the other aspects that can contribute as well. For example the Heritage & Clayman (2010) reading on the techniques used to create a greater response from an audience was an excellent learning material for me. It was also interesting to consider the way in which speeches are reported by media outlets and the use of quotes versus quotational sequences (Clayman 2010). I think learning about all the different levels that go into creating an effective speech has definitely increased my level of understanding of speaking and scripting.

Overall I found this blogging assignment to be a very effective learning tool. The tasks have helped me to become better versed in the world of speaking and scripting and the weekly tasks have helped to keep me accountable to a study schedule. The task has also helped to better prepare me for Assignment 2.



References
Clayman, S. (1990). From talk to text: newspaper accounts of reporter-source interactions. Media Culture & Society, 12, 79- 103.

Heritage, J & Clayman, S 2010 Talk in Action: Interactions, Identities, and Institutions, WileyBlackwell, West Sussex, pp. 263-287.