Preparing a talk

This was the thought that popped into my head and made me want to share.

Let's face it, giving talks (or lessons) are part of being LDS. From the time that you can peer over the pulipt in primary, we ask you to speak.

Preparing a talk is a daunting task. You are given two or three words as a subject, a time frame, and then, free range. How do you even begin?

1. Research. Gotta love the internet. Start with www.lds.org, the scriptures, Conference talks, etc., are all there. Research your topic.

2. Pick a few points you'd like to make. Not 10, not 20, just a few. Ask yourself, "what do I want someone to hear from this talk?". If your topic is reverence, maybe your main points are that reverence is an emotion, not an action; reverence is something we should always have, not just in the chapel; we should teach our children reverence for sacred things.

3. Find a format. This is my little secret ingredient for giving talks. Have a form for it. Watch, next conference, you'll see many of these techiniques used. Some sequences you can use:

- EASY. (Thanks to my sister for this one.) E-experience, A- apply it, S-scripture, Y- your testimony. Very simple, and very good for youth and primary talks. If you are an adult speaker, I recommend repeating the pattern a few times in your talk.

- a parable (remember Bednar's pickle talk?). Start with a personal story, use symbols in it, and explain those symbols. This is one of the harder ones to write, but one of the more memorable ones to give.

- an acronym. There are two ways to do this one. Take the word you are speaking about, and use one word that applies to each letter. For example, you have a talk on "creating a heavenly home", take 'home'- Heart (love and kindness), Open (having a gospel-sharing home), Marriage (mother and father to lead the home, must have their relationship in place first and foremost), Evening (FHE, and through in scripture study and prayers). The second way to do an acronym is to take a completely unrelated, but familiar, group of letters and do the same thing. I heard a talk 10 years ago about teaching where he did C3PO: creativity, prayer, prepare, present, openness (allowing class participation). See? I still remember it.

-build up and down. Take your main point, the one thing you want to teach in your talk. Build up to it, and than build back down from it. Hm, anyone recognize this pattern?

-one word repeat. You'll see this one in GA talks a lot, too. Take one word, and repeat it as the beginning of several phrases. Ie- Serve your family, your community, your Lord.

-common phrase. I had to give a talk on our speech once. I used "is it kind? is it true? is it necessary?"- kindness, honesty, not gossiping.

- who? what? where? when? and why? In my example of reverence, this is how I'd approach the talk. Who needs to be reverent? What is reverence? Where/when should we be reverent? Why should we have reverence?

4. Prepare each section. See the beauty of having a form? You aren't preparing a 15 min talk anymore. You are preparing several smaller ones, and then flowing them together. Isn't that much easier? Use the scriptures, quotes, and personal experiences from part 1.

5. Write an intro and conclusion. A key rule of public speaking and writing is that your conclusion always ties back to your intro. For example, in my "is it kind? is it true? is it necessary?" talk, I introduced the phrase as one that my mother would remind us of when I fought with my siblings. In the conclusion, I talked about how we are all brothers and sisters.

6. Always, always, always, end with your testimony.

And, some don'ts:

1. Don't do "ode to....." (member of the ward, family member, whomever). Our talks should be focused on the Savior.
2. Don't share a story that is unrelated to the topic. Especially don't spend 20 mins telling everyone about your vacation, and then end with "oh, and we should be nice to each other".
3. Don't ridicule people, other religions, the person who asked you to give the talk, no one.
4. Don't groan about giving the talk at the beginning of the talk. That just shuts people's ears off. "She doesn't want to speak? Well, I don't want to listen."
5. Don't forget that 99% of the people sitting out there have been in your shoes.
6. Don't forget that the Lord makes up for where we are weak.
7. Don't forget to share your testimony throughout the whole talk! That is where you can truly bring the Spirit in.