Speaking and Presenting: Pitches and Persuasion

Overview

Class Central Tips

The hope good presenters project when pitching their ideas is not naïve hope. They’re not Pollyanna at the podium. Instead, the solutions they offer are supported by research, data, and expertise. This course will teach you how to merge hard facts with an imaginative vision in a way that at once resonates with and inspires your audience.

Syllabus

Week 1 | Optimism: Vocabulary

What do the British writer George Orwell and the American designer Charles Eames have in common? We’ll find out in this first week of “Pitches and Persuasion,” the second course in the four-part series “Good with Words: Speaking and Presenting.”

Week 2 | Optimism: Speaking Studies and Speaking Exercises

We’ll take a deeper look at the quality of optimism this week, with a little help from a 19th-century neurologist, a 20th century graduate of Harvard Law School, and a set of 21st-century experiments. It’s going to be a fun week.

Week 3 | Dynamic: Vocabulary

We’ll start by taking a new look at Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream Speech” at the March on Washington in 1963. But we won’t be focusing on his rhythmic cadence or strategic uses of pauses. Instead, we’ll turn our attention to the persuasive power he generates with his head, his arms, and even his heels. Body language, we’ll see, can be some of the most effective languages around.

Week 4 | Dynamic: Studies & Exercises

The first American woman to become a Supreme Court justice. The first German Chancellor to commemorate the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. And a brave political activist who decided the best way to make a statement would be to climb up a flagpole. We learned about each of those figures last week and are now ready to take a look at some helpful research about the quality each of them shared: they communicated with more than just their mouths.