Best Ways to Develop Public Speaking Skills in Children

Public speaking is not only an art but also a skill. It refers to the act of delivering a speech or speaking in front of a large group of people with the motive to inform, entertain or have a discussion with them. Public speaking skills are dependent on skills like communication, listening, concentration, writing, creativity, critical thinking, emotional intelligence, and many others.

The sooner children start to learn public speaking skills the easier it becomes for them to grow into confident and influential adults. But the first and foremost initiative towards their children’s public speaking skills needs to be taken by their parents.

Parents can teach their children public speaking online as well as through physical interactions. They need to realize that they are the roots of their child's tree of life. For that reason, they can encourage their child in many ways to develop public speaking skills.

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If you are a parent who is confused about where to start with making your child learn public speaking, then this article is for you. Here are some of the best ways to get started with the journey of making your children learn public speaking skills:

1. Encourage Listening

Before your children begin to learn public speaking skills, they need to start with developing their listening skills. Active listening forms effective communication, which is a key aspect of public speaking. If children can listen actively, they will grasp more information and learn in a better way. After all, a child will communicate what they learn.

There are many ways to encourage active listening in children to ensure that they are developing public speaking skills at the same time. Listening to influential people, reading stories to them, and attending workshops together are some of the best ways to begin with. PlanetSpark provides several free trial activities to develop listening skills in your child. 

Your child is your mirror and your efforts are going to reflect on their confidence and development of speaking. Here are some ways to encourage the habit of listening in your child, which will eventually drive them to start speaking in public:

• Read stories to them- Reading stories to children is not a thing of the past because of the significant role it plays in the development of a child. Try to make it a habit to read at least one story to your child to cultivate active listening in them. 

Make use of facial expressions and hand gestures to amplify the effect, so that the child can grasp the aspects of speaking skills.

• Instruction games- Instruction games are another fun way to incorporate active listening and concentration in your child. ‘Simon says’ is one of the most famous and easy-to-understand instruction games that parents can play with their children. 

Take pauses between instructions to manifest patience in them. Your child is going to learn from how you speak, so it is important to speak in a constructive style and tone.

• Attend public events and workshops- You can take your child to public events and public speaking workshops. Watching and listening to confident public speakers will not only enhance your child’s listening, but they will also start feeling comfortable with public speaking. 

There are many platforms to learn public speaking online as well, check out right now Planetspark's debate society.

• Watch host-led educational videos- Ted Talks is one of the most famous platforms to watch host-led educational videos. Ted Talks by kids is a category which children should explore. 

Introducing your child to such platforms where people of all age groups give speeches on a wide range of topics is one of the best means to make them learn public speaking skills.  

2. Improve Writing Ability

It is a fact that writing is the best way to structure thoughts into words and language. It can often be a huge hurdle for children to speak concisely because their thoughts are unstructured. PlanetSpark’s free creative writing trials can help in improving your child’s writing, which will further develop their public speaking skills.

When you are just starting to introduce your child to the habit of writing, it is necessary to realize that grammatical errors will be made. But you do not have to worry about these errors because the focus is on producing meaningful sentences. If your child can do that, then you can move on to correcting their grammatical errors and vocabulary.

Here are some of the key areas to focus on while you are trying to improve your child’s writing ability:

• Writing Letters- Writing letters can sound old school, but in today’s technological world this can be the most effective way to get your child to start writing. 

A child can have unlimited things to talk about, and you can motivate them to start writing about those things in the form of letters to friends and family members. Gradually, you will realize that their writing skills are improving.

• Story prompts- Story prompt activities are not only fun, but they also enlarge the child’s creativity. In this activity, you will give your child a random prompt like ‘imagine working with dinosaurs’ and they will have to write a short story on it. 

This activity will boost your child’s spontaneous thinking, which will further assist them with public speaking skills.

• Online essay writing- In today’s age of technological advancement, children don’t have to confine their thinking ability to specific subjects. One way to make your child learn public speaking skills online is to inspire them to participate in online essay writing platforms and get valuable feedback. 

Essay writing is important to learn public speaking skills as it will improve their ability to structure words into meaningful sentences. 

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3. Practice Speaking

To learn public speaking skills you need to make sure that your child is practicing the art of speaking fluently and concisely. Speaking skills will allow your child to have effective communication with different people. These can be categorized into formal and informal speaking, both of which are equally essential for personality development.

Practicing speaking is going to reflect on your child’s learning by making it easy for them to have meaningful conversations on a wide range of topics. If your child can express their thoughts and opinions distinctly, it will boost their self-confidence in this demanding world.

We have brought to you some of the best tips to enhance your child’s speaking skills:

• Show and Tell- This is an activity that many schools practice routinely to make students learn public speaking skills. In this activity, a child has to describe any of their favorite objects and speak for at least a minute.

By making your child do this activity in front of you, they will be encouraged to transform their creative abilities into speaking skills.

• Storytelling activities- Storytelling activities are not only a great way for amusement, but they also add to the public speaking skills of your child. You can use flashcards, toys, or other random objects as prompts and guide your child to tell a story out loud relating to that object. 

Holding such activities after dinner can strengthen your child’s bond with the family and push them to express themselves often.

• Mock interviews- Children are most comfortable with their parents. Mock interviews are a great way to get your child to think and ask questions. In this activity, you will be the interviewee and your child will be the interviewer.

To make it more interesting, you can play the role of an expert on a silly subject like a barbie expert. Such activity will motivate your child to use their creative skills while speaking. 

• Break the ice- Ice breakers are a fun way to get your child to express their opinions on different subjects and widen their comprehension capability.

This activity can also be done within your child’s friend group, with you as the prompter. Open-ended questions like why do you like this movie or why would you like to go in space can be asked to stimulate your child to speak. 

4. Build Their Focus

As a parent, you would know that it is a laborious task to get your child to focus on a particular subject for a long duration. The sooner you start to build their focus, the faster they will learn public speaking skills. One of the significant aspects of public speaking is concentration.

Once your child has built their focus and is capable of using it effectively at the time of speaking, learning other public speaking skills will become a piece of cake for them. There are many activities and habits that you can add to your child’s daily life, which will help them to build focus gradually. You should be patient with this because building focus will take time, especially for younger children.

Here are some things to get started with to help your child build focus, which will eventually help them with public speaking:

• Mindful breathing- Always start with breathing, it is the simplest and the most easy-to-follow practice. Mindful breathing is exactly what it sounds like- it involves taking deep breaths and being aware of the flow of air through your nostrils. 

Practicing this with your child will build their focus and nurture their emotional regulation- both of which are important for public speaking.

• Light exercises- Oftentimes parents neglect the importance that exercising has on building their child’s focus. The body is connected to the mind, and having an active body plays a great role in the development of concentration, IQ, and awareness. 

Add light exercises like stretching and yoga to your child’s morning routine to make their mind and body flexible. Ultimately your child will start centering their focus on the present, which will help them during public speaking. 

• Concentration games- Games that fixate on building children’s concentration and focus are readily available online and in various playbooks. When children are bored, instead of giving them your phone as a distraction you can offer to play such games with them. 

‘What’s missing?’ and ‘Spot the difference’ are some of the most common concentration activities that you can get your child to play. These games initiate improvement of focus in an enjoyable way.  

• Note-making- Note-making is more of a practice than an activity or game. If your child is inherently interested in reading storybooks then it is a good time for you to introduce them to note-making.

Practicing this would help them to centralize their focus on key highlights of texts. Steadily as their note-making ability would get better, it will also contribute enormously to their public speaking experience. 

5. Positive Body Language

One of the key aspects of learning public speaking skills is to master positive body language. Most of the time body language speaks louder than words and it has a great influence on how your child is perceived in front of an audience. Every parent wants their child to have confident body language, so they don’t get intimidated in strenuous situations.

Body language is what differentiates good public speakers from great public speakers. It is not enough that your child has the ability to memorize the content, they should also have the right skills to present these words. Positive body language consists of facial expressions, eye contact, good posture, and many other aspects that we will discuss below.

Here are some tips to get your child started on mastering positive body language for effective public speaking:

• Eye contact practices- Maintaining eye contact is one of the most influential forms of non-verbal communication. Great public speakers use their ability to maintain eye contact to direct the audience’s attention to their speech. 

You can help your child with maintaining eye contact through different games such as ‘eyes on the forehead’. In this game, you would instruct your child to first maintain eye contact with you and then spontaneously switch it to your forehead or ears, or mouth.

• Teach the use of gestures- Gestures are important in public speaking to amplify the effect of the speech. They are like spices in the dish, that is your speech. Normally the audience would lose interest in what your child is speaking about if the speech is bland. 

The mirror game is a great way to teach your child the use of various gestures. It is a simple and fun game in which you do some gestures while speaking and your child just copies you.

• Magic of a smile- Facial expressions are to public speaking like icing is to a cake- the former enriches the latter. If the speaker is not using appropriate facial expressions, or if they don't have a pleasant expression on their face, the speech can have a negative impression on the audience.

You, as a parent, can teach your child the use of various facial expressions through the same mirror game mentioned above. Frequently smiling will have a positive effect on the child's mental image. 

• Dinner table games- Dinner table games are a great way for a child to learn while bonding with the family. If you are new to teaching body language to your child, you can start with the game of ‘conversing only through body language.’ 

Your child will be provoked to use most of his body when conversing only through gestures and facial expressions. With time it helps them to incorporate this into their public speaking skills.  

The importance of learning public speaking skills can not be underestimated in the overall development of your child. You might have understood by now that public speaking skills do not solely focus on speaking, but they also enhance writing, listening, creativity, and critical thinking skills. Every child has the capability to grow into influential adults, and public speaking will help them ace their respective career goals.

There are many ways to learn public speaking skills online. Go to PlanetSpark to book a free trial for your child right now in public speaking or creative writing or both. 

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