Over the next week or so, we're all going to read several articles from Writing Arguments on the topic of recycling. Your first speech for the course will consist of a 3-minute oral evaluation of one of the articles.

We will spread the speeches out over three days by dividing the class into six groups, two of which will give their speeches each day.

All the students in each group will be giving their speeches on the same article. You may work together with the other members of your group to generate a single, group presentation, or you may work individually (although in the latter case, when you m ake your individual speech, you are not allowed to repeat what has already been said about your article by other speakers in your group - so that you should coordinate ahead of time at least a little bit in order to avoid focusing on the same main points as other members of your group).

If you work together on a single, group presentation, each student in the group must speak for at least 3 minutes, and the group as a whole must finish within 15 minutes (including transition time between speakers). If you work individually, each stude nt's speech should be precisely timed to last 3 minutes - no more, no less.

You may not read your speech from a prepared sheet, but you may have note cards and/or an outline as you speak.

Even if your group works together on a single presentation, you will receive grades individually based on the delivery (voice, gesture, eye contact, etc.), organization (logic, clarity, comprehensiveness, etc.), evidence (detail, relevance, authority, etc.), and persuasiveness (enthusiasm, appeal, assertiveness, etc.) of your personal contribution.

Click here to go to the course syllabus.