I've never been great at public speaking, in fact i kinda suck at it, and the more you suck at something, the more you shy away from it, which is really a bad thing. But I try, you know, to present reasonably well during tutorial, however small the step might be, but before that let's just look at my previous forays/'attempts' into public speaking.

As far as I can remember, my first hand at public speaking was a rather 'big-scale' one-- that is, a malay short story recital during standard 4, it was some animal story lah. I remember memorising like hell before my storytelling, and trying desperately to think of some 'action'- you know la primary school storytelling competition where the more animated you are, the more points you're likely to score. so yeah, try to make your voice more dramatic (a chore for the one who sounds bored- though maybe not so much when i was younger due to higher pitched kid voive), and i remember kids bringing props up on stage too, hats.. etc. oh ya and put on different voices for different characters. (i think i remembered that for like the first few paragraphs then forgot) Seriously, that's perhaps all I could remember of my onstage 3 minutes of fame. I remember most of walking on and offstage while trying not to trip over the snaking mike wire. Needless to say, all I got was a consolatory kilometrico pen.

Of course, there were also instances where i volunteered answers in class, or prompted to volunteer (that sounds contradictory) but even so, i feel dumb when i experience shudders or when my heart rate goes up even after giving a correct answer. if i blurted a wrong one, then i'd feel my ears or cheeks burning slightly. gah, such biological hindrance.

Then another time when I had to speak in front of the class was during english in Form1, the teacher (Pn Puteri i still rmb) asked us to pair up and source materials from the newspaper to illustrate a story i think.. or there were certain criterias to cutting out stuff. whatever it was, we cut out calvin from calvin and hobbes and the mask (as in jim carrey) and some clown.. something of that sort. and when it was our turn to present, i remember quite clearly, the sides of my mouth will start to twitch (i still get it now sometimes and i hate it so) and somehow i found something severely funny, or just nerves set off and i started laughing (til some drool accidentally came out-- damn embarrasing! but i don't think my classmates saw it) and laughed so hard til i had to hold my bladder. not physically/literally in front of the class of course! argh, and my friend who isn't as good in english as i was, was depending on me to guide the presentation and i think she was just looking at me dumbfoundedly. gah. i don't remember how we got thru the presentation but the whole class was probably thinking 'what's so funny?' traumatic.

Of course, JC was the biggie when we're actually graded on public speaking- that is, oral presentation for the dreaded project work (a common topic for whining). I think the problem with me is, since i don't have the natural flair for speaking, i will commit my speech to memory by rehearsing so much, so i can concentrate more on the subtleties like intonation. blah. However, the problem with this is that I will try to follow what i've rehearsed rigidly and when i miss out something i will be like oh shit and try to remember, and i realise that i will look upwards when im trying to memorise something- which is damn ugly i know and something i hope to avoid in the future. whatever it is, i got a stupid smart alec tutor who wrote this comment in my feedback form-- 'holds on to cue card for dear life' damn it. so sarcastic for what. Ironically, my PW tutor commented I gesture too much during rehearsal. Whatever, i still got my A1.

Now, in uni, the only constant practise for oral presentation i get is during physiology tutorial, which i don't mind doing especially since it's in front of a relatively small class, and the presentation time is quite short, like less than 5 minutes. I hoped this would improve my public speaking skills but I think I still get the panic attacks (or euphemistically, adrenaline rush) from time to time. What do i have to do lah. And I think the fear of saying the wrong answer still inhibits me from speaking up during tutorial class. I wonder why this behaviour seems ingrained in me.

As do the tendency to procrastinate. WTH. im supposed to finish my Lipid notes and do the assessment, on top of revising theories for my sociology test on Wed!
But i guess i just felt like writing some post that contained some writing =)