Hello everyone! Before getting into the point of this discussion, I'll let you in on a story a little bit. It's been the second week of college, and I've done two presentations so far. The first thing I've always hoped for before beginning my speech in front of the classroom is that to speak in an organized way, but... Looking back at my performance during recent presentations, I think I'm still far off achieving my goal. :/
While waiting for other groups to have their presentations done, I planned all sorts of things in order to have my speech organized. Some of them were by memorizing my points, keeping myself relax while I talk, and even holding a whiteboard marker as I speak, just in case if I'd use it to illustrate my points. But as soon as I came to the front, things didn't go as planned. I got pretty nervous that the points I prepared turned into rambles. I wasn't even sure if they totally grasped what I tried to convey as my I was nervous that my vision went blank; it was like, I saw my classmates watching me but I wasn't exactly seeing them... it was like I was looking at nothing in particular.
I don't know if it's a problem of me feeling that my audiences are waiting for to quickly deliver my speech, as that's what I feel whenever I make my speech, but is there any way for me to talk in an organized way, and not to ramble my way out?
What do you do when memorizing basic phrases in foreign languages? Is it important to remember the exact meaning of each word in a phrase? Do you just go with the flow of the language instead of asking why certain phrases are said in certain ways?
Here's my voice recording on this topic https://soundcloud.com/user-675352759/english-speaking-practice-5-learning-basic-phrases To be honest, I've been trying to create any topics for my English speaking practice, so hopefully this topic is relevant enough to discuss about!
Fourth English speaking practice! I used to make numerous attempts of recording my voice before recording for real. I was quite busy today so the audio was uploaded only after two attempts of recording!
However, please click on this link: https://soundcloud.com/user-675352759/english-speaking-practice-4
Transcript will be posted in my track's description later.
Here's the link: https://soundcloud.com/user-675352759/english-speaking-practice-on-teaching
Transcript in the description below. Tell me your honest opinion on it! :)
*This topic was made just for the sake of practising my English speaking skill. I've been trying to increase my fluency and expressiveness while speaking in English, but at the same time maintaining my local Malaysian English tone/accent. Please check my recording out on the link below and tell me your honest opinion on it, I need improvements!*
https://soundcloud.com/user-675352759/malaysians-syiok-sendiri
Transcript:
Hi, italki! Today I'm going to talk about one of the things that us Malaysians have, which is the term, "syiok sendiri"! "Syiok sendiri" usually happens when someone comes up to you and gives you a compliment, and then you can't get over the compliment for the whole day or the whole week. That is either because you're extremely happy with it, or you're overthinking about it. Like, "whoa, this person might have certain feelings for me," or, "is there any underlying meaning behind all this!?". So, basically "syiok sendiri" means "to be full of yourself". Why I'm talking about this term right now is because, from what I've observed from Malaysians, they are usually more subtle and not quite direct when it comes to complimenting their friends and people around them. I don't know if that has anything to do with how most Asians are reserved, but I think it's more about Malaysian's pattern of teasing. So, since it's just one of Malaysian's patterns of teasing, don't get offended by it, just in case if you're not a Malaysian, and the people in your country are not used to complimenting people this way. Because I know that everyone in their country has their own way of teasing people and this is how Malaysians do it.
So, as a conclusion, what we have learnt for today are: Malaysian's pattern of teasing, one of them, and also the widely used Malaysian term which is "syiok sendiri"! I'd like to know about other country's pattern of teasing too. If there's anything you'd like to share, anything you'd like to say on this topic, drop a comment below and I'll be really happy to read them! Later.
