The Goal of the Speaker
With his speech “The Last Lecture,” Randy Pausch aimed to show how dedication can lead to success by explaining the story of his childhood dreams. The speaker successfully achieved the goal by persuading the audience of the importance of the advice he provided. The type of speech used here was persuasive, as it was to reinforce and change public opinion on achieving dreams.
Grabbing the Attention of Audience
He adapted to the audience by knowing the target groups and their specific. One of the essential tools he used was decoding and encoding processes. While speaking to the public, he created a mental image of being healthy, for example, by providing an exact visual explanation of his exercises. In addition, motivating aspects of the speech were raised by telling a personal story to the audience, which positively affected the audience.
Four Parts of Introduction
All four parts of the introduction were clearly discussed. First, the speaker grabbed the audience’s attention by using humor, verbal images, exercises, and personal experience. These means also gained him the audience’s goodwill as he was already a well-known individual. The purpose and structure of the speech were clearly presented through the presentation and his previews before the start of his life story.
Usage of Visual Aids
The visual aids helped to create an image and provide a visual representation of his life story. This is connected mostly with the fact that he used photos of his childhood to tell a story. One of the important elements of communication is the message. The visual aids here helped to provide this message in more image representations and texts that helped to formulate both the conclusion and introduction, which became an effective tool.
The Conclusion of the Speech
He wrapped the speech by forming clear and concise bullet points of his ideas and promoting his message both verbally and nonverbally. The visual aids helped formulate these bullet points in the presentation through the advice that he gave to readers. In addition, he also ended the story with the idea that this advice is not about achieving dreams but living life, mentioning the more hidden ideas of the whole.
Application to Informative Speech
One of the applications of informative speech is having clear and concise points in the discussion and a clear topic for the audience. There are different aspects, like visual aids and non-verbal representation, that can help get the audience’s attention. It is essential to address all four parts of the introduction and specific conclusion for the audience to adapt. In addition, the linear model will be applicable for upcoming informative speeches as describing events of different chronologies can confuse the audience.