I attended a lecture that was held at The New School University Center on November 11th to listen to psychology speaker and author Daniel Levitin. A multitude of college students attended the lecture who were interested in Neurochemistry and the brain but some students just came to learn more about his experiments. He came to talk about the Neurochemistry of musical pleasure and why was listening to music pleasureable based on the experiment he conducted. Coming to listen to the lecture, I was unfamiliar with the topic but my goal was to focus on how he presented himself to the audience and if everyone were not interested. Levitin opened up his diligent lecture with a small runthrough of his background and what he did prior to his experiment. …show more content…
Levitin was very organized and well prepared because the speech was wrapped entirely about himself and the experiment. Being so knowledgeable about his topic, his evidence and ideas were very credible. His slides and analogies were very useful. His lecture had a great flow because of the chronological order he followed. From a pinch in the beginning of his life story to a strong finish about his reasoning for the whole examinations and asking for suggestions, I believe it was awe-inspiring to hear the content. Unfortunately, I was disappointed that he made such a topic, where he walk around and be dramatic about, so lifeless. He had no pitch and intonation patterns to excite the audience. This may be because he had a more conservative and conventional group of individuals and he used them to mold how he delivered his lecture. His pace was very slow as he made it significant to emphasize the most important details of his experiment. If it was not for his friendliness and laughter in the introduction of the lecture, I would not have been able to concentrate on what he delivered. Another thing I pointed out was his reliance on his slides, yet he knew which slide was coming up because of his excess practice before. The extemporaneous method worked as an advantage for him because he is very conversational and understanding. I was able to …show more content…
The audience ranged from college students, older professors, young professors, and a friend and me. Everyone wanted to know more about his experiment, give him ideas, or compliment him for his work. Even with his experiment not exactly going as planned, people were very respectful of his zeal for what he was interested in. Most importantly, he never failed to make the people laugh with his comments and jokes, most of which only psychology and neuroscience lovers would understand. The whole goal of public speaking is to get the audience to respond and think about what was presented to them. Levitin achieved this because people were able to ask him questions after he was finished with his lecture. It seemed as if the audience wanted to get him to question his ideas in order for him to improve his experiment and/or start their own experiments based off his concepts. I was surprised to see how the audience had ideas and solutions for his experiment, almost as if they knew more and would take over his spot. Something that I respect about Levitin is his way of including the audience, and as an audience member, I felt as smart as everyone in the room because of how engaging it was. Everyone came for a reason, the ability to learn more than they know and that incentive that they would come out with a new
How does this relate to how you see yourself as a teacher? I appreciated how the teacher was spontaneous in reading to the children. For example, in the story Otis makes a noise putt puff putted chuff and she asked the students to mimic the noise that Otis made. I think that by being spontaneous and being sensitive to the environment and atmosphere learning will be fun and more memorable for the children.
...as a chemist. His stories of chemistry always had a reference to the human condition. He was neither dominated by his feelings nor exclusively regulated to the facts. His methods were the personification of dynamic objectivity, the strange and unique mix of objectivity and subjectivity and then objectivity again. This made his story so unique and meaningful, for it was not a lecture in scientific principles and it was not a purely heartfelt history of his life. The parts that would be expected to be cold and heartless were oddly compassionate, and the parts that were expected to be soaked in emotion were strangely told from a factual point of view.
In this case however under the circumstances that it was an award for humor there is leeway on how the speech could appropriately be delivered. He did a very good job at keeping the audiences attention throughout the whole speech even using aids such as his wife and other members in the crowd.
an attempt to dispose the audience favorably toward the speaker and topic. He stressed the fact
...how useful the demonstration would be in a classroom. The author’s tone is formal and academic in nature, without heartfelt appeals or attempts to persuade by emotion.
The “Doing Nothing” experiment exposed me to a new way of seeing things and also a new level of awkwardness. Standing still in a public place for ten minutes, with people walking past you and starring you down like you are some crazy person is quite the experience. You begin to understand that people take great notice of anything that seems out of the ordinary to them. This is because our society has developed and enacted so many societal norms in today’s day and age.
While analyzing the speech, I notice how he isn’t shaky from nervousness or his voice’s pitch getting higher which makes him confident, is already prepared of what he wants to talk about, and therefore does not cause any distractions towards the audience. His voice tone is at his natural state as I assume as it calm, not quick to rush words out, and engages the audience by not bringing
The speaker organized the presentation very well and made it easy to follow for the audience. She chose words that got the message across clearly and were not difficult to understand. Since this was targeted at a younger audience, she simplified the concepts and was very specific. The sentences of the speech were structured appropriately, and had no grammatical errors. She also included some transitions in between, especially when moving from one idea to the next which made the flow
...experiment, felt that the experiment made such a deep impression on him that he became convinced that “social sciences and psychology, are much more important in today’s world.'; One can only imagine the inner conflicts that were running through his head. After the experiment, he described the mood, “I did want to stop at that time. I turned around and looked at [the experimenter]. I guess it’s a matter of…authority.';
Whitlow did an exemplary job of not only presenting his information, he did a great job of speaking ethically, establishing his credibility, and just by being passionate about the subject matter. As far as the classical metrics we use to judge a orator, such as eye contact, posture, body language, I feel that Dr. Whitlow did a great job demonstrating these skills as they added to the lecture. One thing I noticed was instead of scanning the audience; he made contact with a few audience members. He was careful not to fixate on one member for too long and was sure to have a good distribution of people to look at so it didn’t appear like he was only staring at one part of the auditorium. Not only did show that Dr. Whitlow was comfortable with his audience, it helped foster a connection, and it showed that he was prepared as preparation is associated with eye-contact (Chaney & Green, 2006).
He talked about how to be a true scholar that has the right dutys that comes with being one. Which must also have great knowledge of nature. He says that books can be very helpful since they are keeping the age old ideas alive, which are the best for studying ideas and accomplishments of past people. I also find it interesting because he does not want scholars to follow the rules but go by their own and be a thinking man. Which is pretty different from what we are told today I think. The language he used was very strong and very educational because he was really trying to let everyone know about nature. It is also very convincing since he is trying to persuade them into becoming a “Man
He used the word “science” repeatedly to solidify his point: “Science must shape policy! Science is universal! Science brings out the best in us!” The crowd went wild as he exclaimed these statements. He used a hand-held microphone, but it was not a distraction or hindrance for him.
Individuals will never recognize what astonishing things can transpire if they don't escape their customary range of familiarity and investigate new things. As to me, taking this class is extraordinary compared to other choices I have ever done in my life. I could never hope to get the hang of anything like this earlier and the amazing and productive knowledge of Doctor G brings me. Whenever I come to his class, I feel the excitement to learn new things, new stories, and life lessons of Dr. G. It is hard to describe how amazement of his class could be if you had never been a part of his class. His analogies are descriptive and humor. Dr. G brings to class not only the lectures but also many valuable life lessons that contribute to improve oneself.
I have also learned about different types of audiences and speeches including persuasive, informative, entertaining and delivering special occasion speeches. It came to my attention that whenever I was making these presentations or speeches, I needed to do so with confidence, consistence and practice before the actual presentation and completely eliminate the element of panic. It was also clear that capturing the attention of the audience and engaging them in the whole process, it was necessary to have a very strong introduction and also try and use visuals to deliver the message. It was therefore vital to respect each person’s diversity and cultural values (Lucas, 2011).
However, I do feel that he looked at his slides more than he did the audience. Another critic I have about his presentation is that I feel that he could have spoken a bit more loudly. Emily Black's presentation was very well done and it was another one of my favorite presentations from the second day of presentations. Throughout her presentation she was very well spoken. She faced the audience and made eye contact.