We began by learning about filler words:
Why do we use filler words?
1) Give a chance for our brain to catch up.
2) To avoid silence.
3) Habit
Some commonly used filler words:
- Um: “I, um, don’t think you want to go that way.
- Uh: “Can you, uh, give this one more look before turning it in?”
- Er: “This sounds like it, er, could possibly be a violation.”
- Ah: “I think that ah…yes, that’s the email I need.”
- Like: “She has, like, a million unread messages.”
- Okay: “Okay, I think we’re ready to get started.”
- Right: “Yes, right, I do remember you mentioning that.”
- You know: “I always save everything just in case, you know?”
- Totally: “That’s totally what he did, even after our meeting.”
- Literally: “I literally saw the email one minute ago.”
- Well: “Well, let’s hold off on that discussion for now.”
- You see: “You see, I didn’t plan for the project to take that long.”
- Sorta: “You might sorta like itt.”
- I guess: “I guess we can try that if you want.”
- Kinda: “It’s kinda like when you go to the beach.”
- So: “So I think we should eat dinner at 6:00.”
- And: (run-on sentences)
Try saying these sentences without the filler word. You sound so much more confident and sure of yourself.😎
How do we eliminate these filler words from our vocabulary?
1. Slow down
Slowing down your speech is an effective way to lessen your fillers. When you talk too fast, it can be difficult for your speech to catch up with your thoughts, increasing your use of filler words.
Research suggests that the average person thinks at 400 words per minute, but can only speak about 125 words in the same period. This means that your thoughts are naturally quicker than your speech. And if you speak faster than normal, your mouth will have an even harder time catching up with your thought process.
The solution is to talk at a comfortable pace. When you speak slowly, you’re able to articulate your thoughts more clearly. Slowing down also improves your pronunciation and intonation, allowing you to emphasize important words and phrases. This helps your audience retain information better.
2. Embrace the pause
Eliminate your crutch words by incorporating strategic pauses in your speech.
Work strategic pauses into your speech. These filled pauses not only lessen your “ums” and “ahs”, but they also serve various purposes. You can use strategic pauses to add dramatic impact to a sentence, give your audience time to absorb an idea, or to transition to a new concept. Make sure to maintain eye contact during the pause so that you don’t look like you are trying to remember something by looking away.
Get comfortable with silence.
3. Record yourself
Most of the time, your mind doesn’t even register your filler words as you say them. Filming or recording yourself while practicing your speech allows you to catch all those instances. Once you’ve identified the parts in your speech where you tend to say “um” or “like” more often, you can think of a way to avoid them.
For example, many people subconsciously say “like” when they’re about to expound on an idea. You can catch that mistake when you watch your recording, then you can avoid it by saying “I mean” or “this means” instead.
Recording yourself also allows you to identify your crutch words, or the verbal fillers you tend to overuse. Once you know your crutches, you’ll be more aware when you’re about to say them, making it easier to break the habit.
4. Extra tips:
- Practice a little louder. You will notice those fillers if you are speaking much louder than usual.
- In the place where you would put a pause, say period or pause out loud and then change to thinking it silently instead.
- breath in the place of the filler word.
- Pause, Think, Answer
- Try closing your mouth in between thoughts. Sometimes with your mouth closed it removes the tendency to fill the space with sound.
Responding to arguments
Suggested outline:
- First, respond to the opposing team’s framework or goal and explain why your framework or goal is better.
- Next, go through the opposing team’s arguments in order with your responses so it is easy to follow. You can order them according to stock issues or according to how they were presented.
- Finally, reinforce your own arguments.
Points to consider (stock issues):
- Topicality – Did the AFF case do what the resolution requires?
- Significance – How many people are affected? Are the problems serious?
- Inherency – Is the plan addressing the true root of the problem? Is the problem already being solved another way?
- Solvency – Will the plan solve the harms? Are there any problems with administration, funding, or enforcement?
- Disadvantages – What new problems will occur by changing the status quo? What new problems will occur by putting the new plan in place?
Other issues to consider:
- Address problems with the link
“Football is the best sport because the satisfaction of running a ball across a long field leads to more self confidence which will lead to getting a better job.” The other team could respond to the link of running the ball across a field, by pointing out that 1. Not all players get to run the ball. 2. Other issues could affect self esteem and merely running a ball across a field is not a guarantee of effectiveness.
- Impact turn
Turn the impact from the direction of the opposing team to your direction.
“Running a ball across a field to make a touch down can actually be a bad thing because it can lead to pride and unrealistic views of self that can cause people to not get hired for a job or to be promoted in a job.”
- Diminish their impact
This is where you argue that their impact will not happen. “The affirmative team states playing football will lead to a better life due to a better self-esteem, but there are many factors to a better life than just self esteem so this impact is extremely unlikely.”
- Outweighing impacts
We will talk more about this later, but it is essentially proving that your impact is more important. “Even if running a ball down a field will result in a high self esteem the problems with playing football far outweigh the benefits when you consider the lifetime of physical problems that result and the risk of serious injury.”
- Non-unique
This is where you point out that the impacts will happen regardless of if their plan will happen. For example, “Even if a student does not play football they can still get a good job.”
- Definitions
If the other team did not define what a “good job” is, then you can explore what that means. For example, a good job can mean that you make a lot of money, enjoy your work, get a lot of time off, get a lot of respect, etc.