How to learn to speak beautifully and express your thoughts correctly

From his lips flowed such competent, clear speech, such intelligent and deep thoughts that from an old man he turned into a stately, representative speaker. Nobody noticed his thick glasses, bald head and threadbare suit anymore. Isn't it amazing?

Agree: clear, consistent and convincing presentation of your thoughts is a real art. And in order for your words to be listened to in the same way as that professor, you need to give a speech and learn to speak competently. This will be useful to you in any area of ​​life.

Thanks to these skills, you can be the life of the party, easily convince a potential partner to sign a contract with you, speak effectively in front of an audience and achieve any goals you set.

What does it mean to “speak beautifully” and why is it important to learn it?

We all want to communicate freely with other people, easily convey our thoughts to them, be able to interest the interlocutor and look decent in his eyes. This helps us achieve a certain level of success and become popular.

Let's describe a well-delivered speech:

• leisurely;
• easy, without long awkward pauses and unexpected hesitations;
• it does not contain profanity or filler words;
• the narrative can be called meaningful;
• accompanied by moderate gestures and facial expressions;
• sounds emotional, not monotonous.

The ability to speak clearly, consistently and convincingly will be useful in all areas of life and will help out in any situation. Whether you are a professor at an institute or a teacher at school, a businessman, a sales manager - with the help of speech you can attract the attention of the audience or get an important contract signed.

The art of eloquence is useful to any person. It allows you to influence people, control their actions and actions, and charge the audience with your energy and mood. Ultimately, having mastered this art, you will easily become the life of the party, be able to speak brilliantly in front of people and successfully negotiate.

For a speech to sound beautiful and convincing, the speaker himself must be an energetic, educated, well-read and self-confident person. Only in this way can he captivate the audience, inspire trust and sympathy, penetrate human souls and motivate people. And it’s good if a person knows how to develop charisma. Then listeners will certainly want to make their secret dreams come true and begin to take active action.

But this is the emotional side of the issue. It is often discussed at various motivating and inspiring trainings, where they teach how to become a leader. However, sometimes a person simply needs to deliver a clear, intelligible, confident speech with a competent and logically structured narrative. It includes the following required elements:

• diction (clear pronunciation of sounds);
• pace (the ability to speak slowly or quickly, without slowing down or chattering);
• voice volume;
• intonation;
• literacy;
• rich vocabulary;
• purity (absence of parasitic words);
• accuracy (use of the most appropriate words to express thoughts, structured narration without “water”);
• expressiveness (metaphors, comparisons, synonyms, figurative expressions and other linguistic means).

A person begins to develop speaking skills from birth. Parents constantly communicate with the child, read fairy tales to him, teach him poetry - all this contributes to the formation of correct and beautiful speech. But an adult will have to develop his speaking skills on his own.

Getting rid of parasitic words

It is no coincidence that parasitic words have this name. A parasite is a creature that lives at someone else’s expense, is not useful, unnecessary and even harmful. Parasitic words eat up your listener’s attention, sometimes distracting them from the main idea so much that the interlocutor begins to count them.

Imagine how stupid this is: you put your heart and soul into sharing something interesting and important, and your friend counts the words “in short” and “that’s it.”

Speech and thinking are interconnected, speech parasites live in your head and parasitize on your thoughts.

Remember: you say a filler word not because it helps you express your thoughts better, but because you have nothing to say instead.

It's like a patch to cover a hole in a sentence, and it looks as messy as a patch on clothing.

To build competent speech and get rid of parasites, pay attention to them. The best way to do this is to record your own voice. After listening to the recording of several conversations, you will understand the logic by which you arrange these harmful words. Figure out what exactly your speech is missing in order to avoid patches, start practicing and you will definitely achieve results.

Working on speech technique

Form and content are the main aspects that characterize speech. The form represents the technical side of the issue. These include: diction, voice volume, speech rate. Content means semantic content, i.e. correctly formed thoughts, well-structured speech, ability to lead a discussion, rich vocabulary. For a speech to sound beautiful, it must be thoughtful.

Working on speech skills is a fairly lengthy process. It includes the following areas:

• diction training;
• practicing speech techniques;
• speech development (increasing vocabulary, clearing parasitic words).

Diction training

Diction is the correct and clear pronunciation of sounds. If you have problems in this area, you can identify them in one of the following two ways:

• independently, using a voice recorder of the conversation;
• with the help of a pronunciation specialist - speech therapist.

In the first case, you need to read aloud an excerpt from the text (it is better if it is the text of an audiobook spoken by a professional actor) and record it on a voice recorder. Then listen to the recording, compare it with the actor’s and highlight the shortcomings. To be safe, let someone else close to you listen to this recording. Let them share their opinions too. This will help you identify diction flaws that you will have to work on in the future.

In the second case, I advise you to contact a speech therapist - a specialist who diagnoses and corrects speech defects in people of different ages. Basically, parents whose children have difficulty pronouncing words most often turn to a speech therapist. It is at preschool age that it is easiest to get the correct pronunciation. However, you should not be embarrassed by a speech therapist if you have not been a child for a long time, and problems with diction have not gone away.

The most common diction disorders:

• burr;
• lisp;
• stuttering;
• fuzzy whistling sounds;
• “swallowing” individual sounds, etc.

Regular classes with a speech therapist will help you quickly establish correct pronunciation and consolidate it.

Systematic training of the speech apparatus is also important. Be sure to do the following exercises at least once a day:

• perform articulatory gymnastics;
• read poetry or prose aloud, pronouncing each sound clearly;
• speak tongue twisters.

While saying tongue twisters, place nuts or candy behind your cheeks. It will most likely be very difficult to understand what you are trying to say at first. But gradually you will overcome the resistance, and the pronunciation will become clearer. This exercise is regularly performed by announcers and actors.

Practicing speech techniques

To make your speech sound beautiful, in addition to diction, you still need to work on its elements.

1. Intonation . With its help, speech becomes “alive,” emotionally charged and expressive. Reading aloud with expression is a great way to practice. Read plays as if you were performing on stage, trying to express the emotions of the characters as believably as possible.
2. Rate of speech . The speed of pronunciation greatly influences how your interlocutors perceive what you say. Speech that is too slow puts people to sleep and people lose the thread of the conversation. And the too fast pace forces you to listen intensely to the conversation in order to catch the main idea. As a result, the listener has to ask again.
3. Volume and strength of voice . It is very important to learn to control the strength and volume of your voice so that during a conversation you do not whisper or scream. It is usually advised to speak 30% louder than usual, as if you want to be heard by the person standing behind the interlocutor. By the way, most people involuntarily begin to speak louder, especially when they meet friends or acquaintances on the street.
4. Volume of voice . Volumetric is called a “chest” voice, which sounds as if from the chest. It is deeper, more sonorous, stronger and more pleasant. The following exercise will help you achieve a voluminous voice: place your hand on your chest and pronounce the vowels “a”, “u”, “s”, “o”, “e”. As you speak, you will feel a vibration in your chest with your hand. Try to strengthen it. To achieve the effect, perform this exercise daily for 5-10 minutes.
5. Breathing . During a conversation, try to breathe calmly and measuredly. Then the voice will sound confident, the timbre will become softer, and the speech itself will be calmer. If you breathe too quickly and intermittently, your voice will sound weak and unsteady. Proper breathing can be learned through special practices.

Let's take a closer look at one of the most common mistakes related to pronunciation - too fast a speech rate. When a person jabbers, it is very difficult to perceive him by ear. In addition, in a hurry to tell everything as quickly as possible, he begins to swallow individual words, and in general he may blurt out too much.

To stop chattering and swallowing words, you need to learn to control the pace of the conversation. Proper breathing will help a lot here. Before you say anything, try to take a moderately deep breath, calm down and think that you have absolutely no hurry. To practice speaking speed, you can say out loud at a slow pace, for example, a sequence of numbers from 1 to 100. The more often you practice, the faster you will get used to speaking slowly.

“Putting up” a vote

A well-trained voice is needed not only by actors, musicians and representatives of other creative professions, but also by those people who want to learn how to speak beautifully and clearly express their thoughts.

To become the owner of a voice that has ideal strength, range and timbre, you need to systematically train it. Clear and loud recitation of poems, prose poems, elegies, fables, or any other texts that evoke positive emotions will help improve your voice power.

To expand and “tune” the range of your voice, perform special text exercises every day in the lowest or highest tones. Depending on your goal, your voice should become lower or higher.

The timbre of the voice depends on the additional tone (overtones). The sound of the additional tone resembles a kind of echo. An additional tone occurs when the sound of your voice is reflected from the larynx, skull, chest cavity, or the surface of any other natural resonator.

Speech development

More and more people cannot formulate sentences correctly, do not know the meanings of many words, and abuse filler words and profanity. I think this is mainly due to the fact that most people prefer to watch TV or go to the movies instead of reading an interesting book. But you and I are not like that. At a minimum, you are already reading this article, and I am writing it for you. Therefore, we continue to develop speech.

Correct sentence construction

It is very difficult to understand a person who, during a conversation, jumps from topic to topic, tries for a painfully long time to find the right words and cannot form sentences correctly, depriving his story of logic.

But the order of words is of great importance. This is taught at school during Russian language lessons. Due to incorrect word order, the meaning of the sentence is distorted and may even cause laughter. Let me give you a few examples of semantic errors.

1. Residents of the house demanded troubleshooting and repairs (What did the residents demand? Make repairs or eliminate them?).
2. The owner kicked the dog, which immediately took offense and ran away (The leg got offended and ran away?).
3. A few years later he met her again. This was, unfortunately, a 39-year-old married lady (Is it a pity that she is already 39 years old? Or that she is married?).

To avoid such mistakes in a conversation, I advise you to do the following:

• improve literacy with the help of Russian language textbooks and reference books;
• Read at least 30 minutes every day - preference is best given to fiction, journalism, and special books on development.
• retell what you read - just be sure to check how consistently and logically you repeat the text.

Increasing vocabulary

A meager vocabulary does not allow one to fully express thoughts, forcing a person to constantly stumble in search of the right word. Such speech sounds choppy and monotonous, because the same words are used, and overall produces a repulsive impression.

Regular replenishment of vocabulary will be ensured by the following actions.

1. Read quality literature daily. Be sure to get yourself a notebook where you will write down your favorite phrases and clever expressions. At the right moment, the right quote will come to mind and embellish your speech.
2. Working with an explanatory dictionary. As soon as you come across a new word, be sure to check its meaning in a dictionary. You can write down the word and try to remember it, but only in context, in order to avoid incorrect use of the term in the future.
3. Solving crosswords, scanwords and other games that require an extensive vocabulary.
4. Selection of synonyms. This is great practice for completing a thesaurus and will help you avoid tautology when speaking. Now there are various applications for smartphones that help you select synonyms.

Getting rid of parasitic words

Parasitic words include words and phrases devoid of any semantic meaning:

• Well;
• Briefly speaking;
• exactly this;
• type;
• Here;
• as if, etc.

Most often, a person pronounces them unconsciously to fill the pause that has arisen. The insidiousness of parasite words is that their use becomes a bad habit. It can be eradicated only by making conscious efforts. Here are some tips.

1. Record any conversation you have with friends or relatives on a voice recorder.
2. Listen to the recording and identify the filler words.
3. Train yourself to speak a little slower than you are used to, so that you have time to realize the moment when you want to utter a harmful word. It's better to take a short break.
4. Ask relatives, friends and acquaintances to make comments to you as soon as they hear the parasitic word. And so that the motivation of your interlocutors is even stronger and they listen more greedily to your speech, pay them 50 rubles for each “parasite” that slips through. This way you will have better control over yourself, otherwise you will go broke.

It will be difficult at first. After all, eradicating a bad habit requires enormous effort, powerful self-discipline and control. It will take 2 to 3 weeks of hard work to clear your speech of “slag.”

Learning to describe objects

This exercise will help you learn to speak beautifully, express your thoughts clearly and easily talk about a particular subject all day long. Focus your attention on some object that you have in your home: a wall clock, a plate, a gas stove, a sink, etc. Think about this subject and try to talk only about it for 5-7 minutes. Try to use beautiful literary language.

At first it will be very difficult for you, but over time you will learn to describe objects in literary language. As soon as you see progress, complicate the task: gradually increase the training time and choose those items whose description causes you certain difficulties.

Speech training

The best exercise for speaking is quality speaking practice. Someone who just talks a lot doesn't always talk really well. Strive to ensure that during any conversation your speech is coherent, thoughtful, and reasoned. Dialogues are good for building a logical train of thought. Discuss with friends the books you read, the movies you watched, and various events.

Here are a few recommendations that will help you with your speech.

1. Read and retell . I have already written that reading helps to enrich vocabulary, develops memory and thinking. By retelling what you read, you will better understand and remember the material, learn new words and phrases, and various figures of speech.
2. Write . If you need to speak in front of an audience, be sure to write down your speech on paper. Re-read it, see what else you can add or remove, whether the logic is broken, whether there are any semantic errors. Remember that the best improvisation is a well-rehearsed one.
3. Watch performances by famous speakers . But not with the goal of motivating yourself, but to analyze the performance. Notice all the important details: how the speech is structured, how the speaker moves, what are his gestures, facial expressions, timbre of voice and pace of speech. If a speech particularly resonates with you, try writing it down on paper from memory. Then imagine yourself speaking in front of a large audience and read your speech out loud. Record your performance on camera. Review it, noting mistakes and points that need to be worked on.

As you can see, there are no special secrets in delivering a beautiful speech. To achieve a good result you need to work on yourself and constant practice.

Finally, I recommend watching a video in which a radio host and speech technique teacher shares the secrets of good diction.

Advice for those who will practice diction on their own

All classes should begin with exercises to relax the muscles responsible for correct articulation. It is better to follow a certain sequence of exercises. You need to start the exercises with the simplest ones, gradually moving on to more complex ones. You need to exercise every day. Proceed to the next exercise only after the previous one has been fully mastered. Every day you need to set new goals and objectives. The achieved results need to be maintained from time to time by repeating the basic exercises.

Keeping listeners' attention

The main function of beautiful speech is the ability to attract the attention of the interlocutor. You always want to listen to an eloquent storyteller; such a person easily becomes the life of the party, he has many friends and is rarely alone.

The secret of an attractive speech is simple:

it is involvement in the storytelling process. The brighter the storyteller's eyes shine, the more he wants to intrigue and surprise his listener, the more tangible the result. You can master this art and develop eloquence by attending courses on competent speech and acting classes, and it consists of three main factors:

1. Bright intonations.
   Through intonation, emotions are conveyed to the listener; he gets the opportunity to enjoy the story not only on an informative level, but also on a sensory or empathy level.
2. Eventfulness.
   The question from an interested listener is: “what happened next?” The answer to it is the event, that is, what the whole story was started for. There are many events in an interesting story; the narrator masterfully leads the listener from one to the next, preventing him from relaxing and getting bored.
3. Structure and logic.
   Well-delivered speech is easier to understand. Without structure, it turns into a pile of information, which is difficult and tedious to navigate. Logic allows you to correctly place accents, highlight important points in the story and highlight secondary ones. Logic reveals thought.

Speech errors: types, causes, examples

We think of speech as an abstract category, inaccessible to direct perception. Meanwhile, this is the most important indicator of a person’s culture, his intellect and thinking, a way of understanding the complex connections of nature, things, society and transmitting this information through communication. It is obvious that when learning and already using something, we make mistakes due to inability or ignorance. And speech in this regard is no exception. Moreover, the concept of speech culture as the idea of ​​a “speech ideal” is inextricably linked with the concept of speech error. In this article we will look at their types, examples and reasons. Read more…

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Online program "Modern Rhetoric"

In 8 weeks in this program, you will master and learn how to apply traditional and modern rhetoric techniques for speeches, presentations, vlogging, stand-ups and much more. You will learn to speak clearly, intelligibly, control your voice, behave correctly on stage and work with the audience, cope with the fear of speaking, prepare good speeches - from planning and searching for material to the actual text of the speech, and, of course, argue your speech. The program is suitable for both those who are just starting their journey as a speaker, and those who are already professionals but want to improve their skills. Find out more...

Working with words is work, but the work is interesting and exciting. The faster you immerse yourself in the process, the faster you will taste success. Go for it!

We also recommend reading:

• Storytelling
• Preparing and delivering a speech
• Tips for working effectively with your audience
• How to develop eloquence: some tips
• Five Canons of Rhetoric
• Recommendations for learning Russian
• Learning your native language: a selection of useful materials
• The power of words in practice
• Orthoepy - why it is important to speak correctly and how these rules arise
• Best Blog Content of 2021: Writing
• Nora Gal's advice to those who work with words

Key words:1Rhetoric

Ready-made program for increasing vocabulary for a week

Especially for you, I have compiled an express program to increase your active and passive vocabulary. Enjoy it for your health.

Monday:

• read 15 pages of literary text;
• write a summary of the film “Titanic”;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “conjuncture”, “gaslighting”, “alabaster”;
• make 2 sentences with each of the three words;
• come up with a sentence in which all words begin with the letter M;
• retell your favorite childhood cartoon.

Tuesday:

• read 15 pages of popular science text;
• write an essay on the topic “What freedom means to you”;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “unflattering”, “agoraphobia”, “underwriter”;
• make 2 sentences with each;
• learn a short poem and recite it in front of the mirror.

Wednesday:

• read 15 pages of business text (economic article, legal document or legal act, etc.);
• write a letter to a real or imaginary friend and describe the events of recent days;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “columella”, “bivouac”, “familiarity”;
• make 2 sentences with each;
• do an exercise to select synonyms.

Thursday:

• read 15 pages of entertaining text (publications on social networks, jokes, secular news, etc.);
• write a statement to the police about the theft (fictitious, you do not need to send it);
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “barbarism”, “dysphoria”, “aberration”;
• come up with 2 sentences with each of them;
• choose words with the same root for the word “sentence”;
• solve a small crossword puzzle (about 10 words).

Friday:

• read 15 pages of scientific text;
• write an article based on what you read and present the content in your own words;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “enfilade”, “perlustration”, “lemniscate”;
• make 2 sentences with each word;
• retell the last movie you watched.

Saturday:

• read 15 pages of literary text;
• write a detailed review about your favorite vacation spot;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “bruxism”, “liass”, “customization”;
• make 2 sentences with each word.

Sunday:

• read 15 pages of any text;
• learn and remember the meaning of the words “inclusion”, “reisshina”, “apocrypha”;
• make 2 sentences with each of them.

Our program is just a sample. You can start there and then continue on your own. Or make your own right away. The main thing is to start practicing and do it regularly.