DISQUS

Chris

Good thoughts and ideas. I would echo the idea of starting and barcamps are a great place to start. They're more informal.

I would add three things for getting started:

1. Start today - it could be at work, with your sports or parents group. Don't stand back but see it as an opportunity to practice. Be sure to always ask for feedback. Find out "what could I have done better?" Don't just ask "how was it"? Lots of people are too nice to say what they really think, so you need to ask a more focused question.. If you want to grow as a speaker, you need to know what's working (keep it and do more of it) and where to work on things

2. Have something to say - pick a topic that you're passionate about. Enthusiasm and knowledge is contagious and engaging.

3. Watch and learn. Listen to great presentations and think about what the speaker is choosing do at each point. Learn from really good speakers that are giving the same type of talks that you want to give. There's a style for the inspirational speech, a style for the Ted Talks (i.e. speakers tell a story) and almost all of the Ted talks are wonderful to learn from; and then there's the "how to do it" demo/speech.

Remember to have fun yourself - if you have some fun, chances are your audience will too.

Darlene

Nicole

Great list - love the Stingy Scholar!!

Darlene

Hi Nicole

These tools are most often referred to as Digital Lifestyle Aggregators and the fundamental idea is integrating all content about/by one person across various facets of their life: personal communication/information management, friends, family, social networks, etc.

Darlene

I posted a few more pictures of props on Flickr and at http://library.usask.ca/fichter/blog_on_the_side/

Original photos by the travellinlibrarian.