Have them at HELLO…the Art of the Introduction

How to begin.  The writer’s age-old question.  In the past and possibly now as well, publishers would read only the first page of an author’s work to determine whether it was worth turning the page to read on. Hundreds of potential call numbers waiting to be assigned so they could someday be found on the shelves at libraries and in bookstores…were tossed into the bin each day to become the ashes of forgotten dreams. 

Sounds dramatically disappointing, right?  Now the orator’s question; your question, is the same…how do I begin? How do I capture attention and keep it?  Can I give a speech compelling enough to generate a laugh, spark an interest, or persuade someone to adopt my recommendation?  Can I grab and hold the audience’s attention?

The answer?  Yes, you can!  You just have to understand that a speech is NOT an essay, nor a research paper.  And no one is going to willingly get dressed, drive somewhere, and walk into a room to sit down and listen to one of those presentations for ten minutes or even five unless he or she  is a scientist or specialist interested specifically in that topic, or getting a grade for going.

But a speech is different.  People love to hear a good speech given to share great information; to uplift and encourage, to persuade and generate better understanding. Why? Because we are human and we are connected by stories.

The key is YOU!  Communication is powerful when done well.  I am going to use impromptu speaking to demonstrate how to give a compelling introduction. But first, if you compete in impromptu, you need a commonplace book!

Now I have been teaching English Grammar & Writing for years to my own children as a homeschool mom and to others in schools and co-ops.  I teach from a classical curriculum called Classical Writing - I was even a distributor for the curricula for a few years because I think everyone should use it.  I like it that much - from K-12. (visit classicalwriting.com and start in kindergarten!)

At one point the author recommends a skill called commonplacing. She is not the only one to recommend doing this.  Many speakers, writers, teachers, administrators, business leaders, and entrepreneurs understand the value of this skill.  So what is commonplacing?  Here’s a quick run down:

1. When you read ANYTHING, have a journal nearby.  Not a wimpy little 3x4 inch mini-book, but a real journal with lines and paper that likes ink or pencil.  I like the spiral bound ones because I can easily lay them open to the page I am on until I continue from where I left off. Hardback books will not lay open to one page, but are popular because of their design.

2. The journal is USELESS without a PEN.  Consider purchasing a pen you really like; an erasable one, a fountain pen, or colored pens.  It doesn’t really matter - that pen closest to you is fine as well.  Just make sure there is ALWAYS a pen clipped to your journal.

3. Carry the journal and pen with you EVERYWHERE.  

4. What will you write? Great question.  As you read books, write down anything that stands out to you and that you want to remember or that would make for good conversation.  Anything that impacts you.  Stories that you want to share.  Quotes.  Thoughts about thoughts.

   1. One of the best ways to use a commonplace book is when micro-learning on the internet. Let’s say you are watching youtube to learn something and you don’t usually expect that the speaker might drop a golden nugget skill for you but there it is…write that down!

Now it is very important to include the title and author for anything you record in the book.  People own ideas and you need to give them credit.

2. Sometimes another person’s ideas will spark your thinking - you will suddenly have an idea about a story you should tell…write it down.  I do not know how many times at bedtime I have thought, “I’ll do it in the morning” and…after a night’s sleep and all the other life going on, the thought won’t come back.  The whole point of having the book is the discipline of using it in the moment.

3. You may be in a class and your professor just hits a chord with you - take your notes as usual but circle that one thing that just resonated with you and write CP in the margin.

4. Leisure reading is CP time.  Keep your CP book nearby for recording those favorite lines or stories or examples - and don’t forget to include the author, title, and PAGE NUMBER  of the book or the webpage (so you can find it again).

5. My eldest daughter diligently commonplaced for all of her junior high and high school years.  She has four volumes of material that inspired her during those years.  Your book will become an extension of you - the words you love, the words that impact you, the words that you will enjoy over and over again.  She used those books for writing papers in college!

6. Don’t forget your family stories as these are often the MOST impactful for use in writing and speaking. Be generous here - leave your opinion out of it and just record what happened and what people did and how they responded.  Leave the judgement about the situation for another time - you might just find your opinion about the event changes over the years.

So today we are focused on introductions.  The goal of the introduction of a speech of any kind is to generate immediate interest in listening - it is often called the hook. Often numerous introductions generally sound similar in a competition room. Why is that?  Think about it…

You enter the room.  You introduce yourself and (for impromptu) you show your timer and draw your topic.  Two minutes later you come forward again, show your timer once more and state, usually, the standard format used for introducing your topic. Here is an example…

“I now have my timer set to zero counting up, and if the judges are ready I will begin. (starts timer) The topic I have drawn today is breath. I would like to discuss this topic in two points, considering first how breath sustains life and second, looking at a person who lives holding her breath.”

Now this has all the elements required on the ballot: a timer notification and showing the judges the actual zeros on the device, the speech then begins and the topic is announced clearly and a road map is given.  If you are brand new to public speaking this introduction may be a victory for you!  So celebrate!  That’s awesome for beginners!  So it is not bad and it is not wrong to give this kind of introduction, especially if you are just learning and including this information has been a struggle for you.  But once you have conquered this, I want to encourage you to move on to the next step.

As I teach public speaking, I often try to think of the best way to help students improve.  Of course there are hundreds of best ways and everyone learns differently; but the best way is always to remember that your stories have helped you become the person you are today - and that is always compelling. Today I remembered a story from my life that sparked an idea for an introduction.

How do you generate audience interest?  You have to get them involved.  You have to relate to people using your stories.  You help them become part of the conversation without them saying a word. You speak in a way that assures the audience that their perspective matters and you have thought about that.  And you do this by sharing your stories.

I like to watch Toastmasters speeches online.  Now before you grab your phone -  not all Toastmasters speeches are suitable for all audiences - so let mom and dad find a few that are suitable for watching. I watched one where the speaker began using a prop, which you are not allowed to do.  Not only that, the prop was a cigarette which the speaker was about to light, which almost caused me to hit pause and move on to the next video. But then a few audience members booed and he did not light it.  Now he had me.  He never did light the cigarette, instead he mentioned a statistic about how a certain disease killed far more people than smoking did.

What did the speaker do?  He used a prop to worry the audience that he was going to violate all social protocols by smoking in a public space and while giving what was supposed to be an award winning speech. He had them way BEFORE hello.  Next he stopped, and calmly mentioned a statistic to show the audience that their worry about lung cancer might be valid, but that other illnesses also caused a great number of deaths among humans. Once he spoke about that, a hush fell and the audience was captivated.

That speech somehow triggered a memory for me related to my own experience with people smoking.  And suddenly I knew this story was a perfect introduction to certain kinds of topics.  How can you captivate the audience right at the start and keep them captivated for 5 minutes? Make them care, make them laugh, make them worry…then tell them how to address life issues through your topic using stories, examples, quotes (all likely from your CP book) to hold that interest.

Imagine you draw a topic relating to something like: breath, breathing, choked, contained, trapped, isolated, etc.  I wrote down a story in my CP book because I wanted to remember it (not all stories are happy memories, btw). 

Also, I am aware that writing out an entire impromptu here for you is not at all the same as making a few notes and doing it off the top of your head - so give me grace here as this may feel more polished than if it were given in the moment - I wanted you to see the impact of the illustration used from the CP book. Note as well that certain memories recorded in your book about small things can have a big impact, for example how things change over the years - for example going from handles to buttons for car windows.

My impromptu speech on “breath”:

“I am glad cars do not still have handles for rolling the windows up and down, but they were more precise.  Have you ever tried to slide your window down only half an inch with the electric button?  Bzzzt, it’s halfway down…or…Bzt - whoa it just went all the way down! Bzt…up, bzt…up, bzzzt…oh no, not all the way up!  Try it sometime.

I’m an only child.  When I was young after church on Sunday my parents and I would hop in our Cutlas Supreme and go for long drives across the Oklahoma countryside.  There were no cell phones, no headrest movie screens, and no GPS.  And rolling the windows up and down with handles allowed for precision adjustments.  In the 1970’s my parents - along with millions of others - were smokers - and the car window adjustments became my barrier to clean air.

I’m going to talk to you today about breath.  That autonomic process that allows humans to remain alive because the diaphragm pulls air in and pushes it back out. Let’s look at it simply; breathing out versus holding our breath.

Oklahoma is a land of wide open spaces and growing up I was blessed with the freedom of exploration.  On the weekends I would grab my banana yellow ten-speed bike and fly down our steep driveway, banking right, to prepare for the dreaded uphill grunt to reach the end of our street. From there I turned left and enjoyed the slight downhill grade as gravity took over and I stopped pedaling.  I gently engaged the brakes before reaching the steep downhill which required control of the bicycle, but resulted in an exhilarating rush of air in my hair and in my lungs. 

I breathed in the warm air and felt my body fill with energy and elation.  It was good to be alive and God’s creation was full of life - everything was breathing.

In those moments I never really considered that the breath which filled my lungs so easily in those years might someday become a challenging feat for my body.  I could breath deeply then, and that life, that breath, like the presence of God, filled me up with energy, joy, and momentum. 

We don’t consider when we are young that we might become a person who loses the capacity to breath deeply, or that likewise keeping our knowledge of God and His love and grace, tucked safely away - unshared, kept only for ourselves - is like holding our breath. Our breath - the thing that gives us life - like our knowledge of God and His mercy -  can become constrained by our own fears, judgements, or worries.  

The opportunity to give others the gift of breath, the breathing in of the fullness of joy and grace that comes with the understanding that Christ died for us and defeated death and sin, is an opportunity we must embrace.

How many of us see the opportunity to share - but hold our breath in the moment - unsure of what to say or how to begin. Then, moments later it seems the opportunity was fleeting and is now gone.

We exhale, yet with that expiration of air we feel a kind of defeat - the realization that if this becomes a habit, if I continue to hold my breath and let the moment pass - I will potentially become a person that disobeys the call to share the Gospel.

The Gospel is like clean air.  People need it to really breathe - to gain the fullness of life.  

It is a small thing, rolling the car window down an inch or more for clean air to rush in.  Just one more half turn of the handle…  But my parents, who were avid smokers, felt that the cold air was a worse effect than the second hand smoke that filled the car every Sunday afternoon for a few hours.  Each week I would beg for another half inch, an easy adjustment, and the answer was always “no”.  

It’s the same when we refuse to share the Gospel to provide the clean air that cleanses and renews a life.  The Gospel that for those who breathe polluted air can inhale and suddenly be filled with a new Spirit - the Spirit that gives life.

To breathe freely is life.  To hold our breath… is death.  To recognize that the breath of life comes from God and that with every breath we should share His Gospel is life-changing for us and others. So roll down the windows, even when the air is freezing cold, and breathe out the Gospel while you still have breath.”

The stories that impact your life are sometimes small, seemingly unimportant moments.  Those car rides were precious family time exploring Oklahoma.  I remember the joy of the games in the car and the places we went together. 

As you record the good times, try to also remember the challenges.  These can be used without blaming or shaming - that is an important thing to keep in mind.

(I do not blame my parents for not knowing the harms of second hand smoke - no one at that time knew the harms.  Only later did people begin to understand the dangers of smoking and over time, praise God, both of my parents quit smoking.)

Look back at my speech and dissect it a little.  My opening was about the attempt to roll down an electric car window a half an inch - complete with sound effects.  Why would I do this?  Because that half an inch was the difference between me and clean air in those days - and it’s a fun illustration.  The demonstration hooks your audience and puts the judges at ease while making them really curious about your topic.

Then I get to my introduction which is about the problem - the half an inch problem - and now the judges understand why I did the little demo.

Only now do I introduce my topic.  Why? Because the moment you do, your judges look down to write it on the ballot.  Why do they do that - because it’s there, that line on their computer with the question: Topic?  And the question requires an answer.  It is human nature for your judges to do it the moment you state it - so know that will happen.

If you begin your speech with the topic, your judges look down sooner.  Not ideal for you - you want to grab their attention in a way that makes judges NOT WANT TO LOOK DOWN to fill it in - to do it quickly and look back up to hear the rest of your speech.  If you give a compelling opening - your judges want to look back up faster to see what you will say next.  This is the power compelling beginnings hold - for ANY style of speech.  Isn’t it the same for you?  You like to hear compelling beginnings too.

Start your commonplacing, practice creating compelling openings for various impromptu topics using your stories, quotes, and illustrations.  Then use the skill for your platform speeches as well.  Your audience will enjoy your compelling introductions and engage with you and your ideas.