Learning to speak beautifully: what is needed for this, examples of exercises for speech development

When you are about to give a speech at a public event, the first thing a person thinks about is how he will look as a speaker, whether he will be able to speak without hesitation, and whether the audience will like it. And if you have to meet the girl’s parents or have an interview when applying for a job, a sleepless night from excitement is guaranteed.

The ability to freely conduct a conversation, formulate and express thoughts is necessary not only for speaking, but also in friendly conversation, study, collegial communication, and business negotiations. Why do some people’s speech flow like a river, while others find it difficult to coherently pronounce an ordinary congratulation, how to learn to speak beautifully and what to do for this - these questions are discussed below.

To speak beautifully - how is it?

The best examples of beautiful speech include interviews or monologues of famous theater and film actors, radio and television announcers, lectures by university teachers or self-improvement trainings. In their speech, information is presented vividly, confidently, clearly, and in the case of actors - emotionally. What distinguishes it from ordinary vernacular, what is it like to speak beautifully?

1. Beautiful speech is speech to the point, literary, literate, rich, with the correct construction of combinations of words, sentences, phraseological units, clear pronunciation of letters in accordance with the rules of orthoepy (pronunciation norms).
2. To speak beautifully means to avoid tautology, that is, too frequent repetitions of the same or related words, introductory phrases that do not carry a semantic load (as they say, in general, etc.), parasitic words (this is the same, as it were, shorter, etc.), abstruse, obscene or slang language.
3. Beautiful speech flows smoothly, without haste, but without stretching out, is pronounced in an even voice, with good intonation, and does not “swallow” endings in words.
4. Competent, beautiful speech is pleasant to the ear, understandable to most, attracts listeners to the speaker, and is well remembered.
5. To speak beautifully with people means to show sincere interest in the interlocutor, use polite words (please, be kind, be kind, thank you, thank you, very nice, etc.), and not allow an ingratiating, cheeky, or arrogant tone in the conversation .

Not only his ability to speak, but also his sociability in society, and therefore his success in life in general, depends on how well a person’s speech is developed. What to do if nature did not endow you with this talent (and this is, of course, a talent)? There is only one way out - learn to express your thoughts, speak competently and beautifully.

Persistence and desire

I want to speak beautifully - this is not just a beautiful slogan. Long-term exercises repeated day after day will help you learn public speaking and will lead to a positive result thanks to great desire, perseverance, and patience. Having a specific goal in mind, for which you deliberately give up a free hour, will be a guide in the complex art of public speaking.

Color your activities with games. For example, start describing any item without stopping. It doesn't matter what you say. The main thing, excluding pauses, is to learn to speak without thinking. Gradually, the “nonsense” will develop into a coherent, beautiful story. Detailing develops attention, speech, and thinking. The attitude towards the outside world is changing.

Ways to develop speech

To learn to express yourself, to speak correctly and beautifully, that is, to develop speech, you need to organize your thoughts. This can be achieved by keeping a diary or blog, making plans for the day, week, month.

Diary entries also require skill and a rich vocabulary. Vocabulary is not replenished on its own, but in the process of studying and reading:

1. Educate yourself, try in every possible way to increase your intelligence.
2. Read classical Russian and foreign literature thoughtfully and slowly.
3. Memorize poetry or prose passages and recite them out loud in front of the mirror.

Try to achieve clear pronunciation and learn to speak beautifully not only by reciting poetry, but also tongue twisters, which, despite their outward meaninglessness, produce beautiful speech. It is usually a short string of words written in such a way as to confuse the speaker's tongue.

Speech teachers consider tongue twisters an excellent language training; they recommend reading them slowly at first, pronouncing the text clearly, and adding pace only after the memorized words begin to “bounce off your teeth.”

We offer examples of tongue twisters for practicing competent speech, many of which you probably remember from childhood, when in kindergarten or elementary school they showed how to learn to speak beautifully.

1. There is grass in the yard, there is firewood on the grass, One firewood, two firewood, Don’t cut wood on the grass of the yard!
2. Senya carries hay in the canopy, Senya will sleep on the hay.
3. The little cuckoo bought a hood, put the cuckoo's hood on, and the little cuckoo looked funny in the hood.
4. Just as all tongue twisters cannot be overstated, all tongue twisters cannot be overstated, so all quick proverbs cannot be overstated, and all tongue twisters cannot be overstated.

Students of acting departments, future radio and television commentators, in order to learn to speak without hesitation and beautifully, pronounce tongue twisters while holding a couple of small nuts in their mouths. This will make the tongue become even more obedient.

A few more tongue twister options

Books to learn to speak beautifully

In learning to speak beautifully, the key task is regular reading. What books should I read to learn to speak beautifully? There is no specific list of books that give a person such a skill. You need to read as much as possible, but the literature must be of high quality. Here are some examples:

• Russian classics. Dostoevsky, Chekhov, Pushkin, Bulgakov, Ilf and Petrov for connoisseurs of the comedy genre, Lermontov - the books of these authors are filled with an abundance of beautiful words;
• High-quality foreign literature. Daniel Defoe, Oscar Wilde, Shakespeare, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Guy de Maupassant, Alexandre Dumas - their books will definitely leave a mark on your soul.

You can read modern authors, such as JK Rowling, Dan Brown, they write well, use competent expressions, interesting literary techniques.

How to express your thoughts correctly and competently

And yet, only a well-delivered speech is not enough to speak beautifully and competently. Literacy presupposes, first of all, intelligence, education, reading, competence in the issues being discussed, and a rich vocabulary. It is easier for a person with a rich vocabulary to express his thoughts, and it is easier for him to learn to speak beautifully. That is why such people move up the career ladder more successfully, get jobs faster, and enjoy greater authority. Wherever a person with a rich vocabulary has to speak, this immediately catches the eye and sets him apart from the mass of other people.

It should be understood that learning to speak correctly and beautifully, having somehow completed school lessons and exclusively courtyard communication behind you, is almost impossible; most beautifully speaking people have been accustomed to good speech since childhood. Reciting poems, tongue twisters and other training will not be enough if there are significant gaps in your knowledge base.

You should care not only about how to develop your speech to perfection and speak beautifully, but also not to talk about topics you don’t understand, and not to use “smart” words whose meaning you don’t understand vaguely.

Public performance

There comes a crucial moment when your speech is intended for a large audience:

• Here it is advisable to think through all the dialogues and lines. Write down the points of the plan. According to the plan, gradually develop the topic of conversation.
• Record your speech on a voice recorder. As you listen to the speech several times, weak expressions will become noticeable. Prepare your speech in advance so that you have enough time to correct the gaps and then the motto of the day: “I want to speak beautifully” will become an indispensable companion.
• It is impossible to learn to speak beautifully without an audience. Those close to you get used to the style of communication and do not notice errors in speech. Unfamiliar listeners will immediately react to an uninteresting story, showing this by behavior and noticeable noise. Before speaking, it is important to know the age characteristics of your upcoming interlocutors.
• Seek advice from friends who have had to speak in public. Take into account their beautiful performances, speech, note key points, use the information received as a “magic wand”.
• Choose answers to the expected questions to learn how to direct your presentation in the right direction. Study books on the topic, write down catchphrases and famous quotes. Base your report on familiar names. With such a basis, your presentation will take on a scientific and fundamental appearance.
• The art of speaking requires mandatory training. Settle for a small and familiar audience at first. Having developed the skills to communicate with a group of people, gradually increase their number in order to learn how to change the flow of the conversation and thematic focus.

How to make your words sound confident and convincing to people around you

Oddly enough, not even all masters of skilled writing are given oratorical abilities. Quite often, a person who perfectly expresses his thoughts “on paper”, when he finds himself in front of an audience, becomes blurred, gets lost and cannot make a speech. This is usually associated with complexes (I have a bad voice, I burr, I will forget the text) or other psychological problems. In this case, the following will help you learn to speak beautifully and confidently:

• voice training classes (phonopedic exercises);
• auto-training (I know what I’m talking about and can improvise, I really want my words to be heard);
• sincerity (if you are honest in front of your listeners, your words will sound convincing).

Persuasive speech is important in many professions, from teachers to medical specialists, from street sellers (you need to convince the buyer that he needs to buy your product) to large businessmen. Therefore, learning to speak well, choosing words correctly, appropriately and beautifully, is also necessary to improve your professional level.

Advice for those who will practice diction on their own

All classes should begin with exercises to relax the muscles responsible for correct articulation. It is better to follow a certain sequence of exercises. You need to start the exercises with the simplest ones, gradually moving on to more complex ones. You need to exercise every day. Proceed to the next exercise only after the previous one has been fully mastered. Every day you need to set new goals and objectives. The achieved results need to be maintained from time to time by repeating the basic exercises.

Exercises for training

If you have all the conditions to speak beautifully and clearly, but your tongue still gets stuck, you need to train your speech. Not only the muscles of the tongue need training, but also the lower jaw, lips, and respiratory organs. To learn to speak competently, beautifully and for a long time, we recommend more often using exercises designed to develop “speech breathing”:

1. For the diaphragm: take any comfortable starting position (lying, sitting, standing), place one hand on the abdominal area, the other on the chest. Inhale through your nose, trying to “inflate” your stomach and chest as much as possible. Exhale slowly through your nose - the stomach and chest “retract” back.
2. Inhale quickly through your nose, hold your breath for a couple of seconds and exhale smoothly through your mouth. Repeat 2 times.
3. Inhale quickly with your mouth wide open. Exhale slowly while pronouncing any vowel sound. Repeat with all vowels.
4. Inhale evenly through your nose. Exhale slowly, counting to 5. If 5 is easy, count to 10, if 10 is easy, count back - 10, 9, 8, etc.
5. Close your lips tightly, pronounce the sound “m” and extend it as long as possible, pronouncing it with different intonations of your voice.
6. Do the same exercise for the sound “r” with your lips open.

The organs involved in the conversation need to “learn” to be mobile in order to speak beautifully. The following exercises will help train them:

• standing at the mirror, stretch your tongue as far forward as possible, repeat 5-10 times;
• alternately touch the tip of the tongue either the right or left surface of the cheek from the inside for 5-7 minutes;
• with closed lips, “polish” with your tongue the back side of the dentition with circular movements 10-15 times in different directions (from right to left and back);
• make circular movements with your tongue sticking out forward 15 times clockwise and counterclockwise (the exercise is not as simple as it might seem);
• for 5-7 minutes, either gather your lips into a tube, or stretch them into a smile;
• puffing out your cheeks, move the air in your mouth, first clockwise, then in the opposite direction.

The “Ball” exercise will also be useful.
Abruptly pronouncing the following series will help you get rid of “swallowing” letters and endings:

• ba-pa, beep, be-pe, be-py, boo-poo, bo-po;
• pa-ba, bee-bee, bee-bee, poo-boo, poo-boo, po-bo;
• wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait;
• Hello, hello, hello, hello, hello;
• kpta-kpto, kptu-kpte, kpti-kpty;
• mvti-mvste, mvsta-mvsto, mvstu-mvsty;
• bird-bird, bird-bird, bird-bird;
• tpka-tpka, tpka-tpka, tpka-tpka.

This fun workout actually “trains” the tongue to pronounce complex letter combinations, which will help you not stumble when pronouncing difficult words, but learn to speak them beautifully and naturally.

If you are preparing for a long speech or lecture, do not forget to breathe correctly, do not strain your vocal cords - start speaking only after taking 2 calm breaths through your nose and exhaling through pursed lips, take short (a few seconds) breaks.

Work on the content and pace of speech

Very often, speech problems arise due to the fact that a person speaks very quickly. Sometimes a thought does not have time to form, but the word has already flown out. And listening to chattering speech is quite difficult. To slow down your rate of speech, you need to do an exercise every day: pronounce words slowly, for example, cities or names, recording yourself on a voice recorder at this time. Then repeat the same in reverse order. The next step is to listen to the text recorded at a fast pace and then repeat it slowly.

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How to become smart

A person who strives to become smart, to learn to speak beautifully and eloquently, must understand that intelligence is obtained through hard work - constant study, reading good literature, reflection, observation, comparison and analysis of facts. This is not a practice of several days or months: “agility of mind” should be established from childhood and constantly develop. Recently, psychologists have noted an increase in the interest of the fairer sex in smart men, which partly explains the desire of young people to appear smart. We hope our readers will be smart enough not to seem smart, but to become smart thanks to the advice from the article.

Presence of gestures and facial expressions

A live conversation always involves movement of the hands and body. A dry presentation of material without a pronounced emotional coloring is boring and implausible.

The speaker, living the content of the speech, forces the audience to join what is dear to him and close to him. These are not just clumsy swings. Every gesture he makes is beautiful and logical. Under the influence of sincerity, a rich, open dialogue between complete strangers is obtained.

It is useful to practice gestures and facial expressions in front of a mirror. Shortcomings and some excesses in movements are immediately visible. An open, beautiful look helps to cope with unnecessary and stupid gestures that do not fit into the overall picture.

Sometimes the accompanying gestures seem inappropriate and provocative. But a cold expression is prone to repulsion and misunderstanding. Find the harmony of words, body, voice.

How to manipulate people

The ability to manipulate people is not the best quality in a person.
As a rule, this ability is associated with such associated character traits as selfishness, cunning, self-interest, lust for power, and capriciousness. And the tools of manipulation are pressure on conscience or pity, hysteria, threats, the ability to speak beautifully and convincingly. Psychologists know manipulative phrases, although even small children are capable of manipulating adults if they succeed at least once. As a rule, those who selflessly love or trust limitlessly are manipulated.

Reading and reading again

An effective way to develop speech in adults and children is reading. You don't need to read everything. Classic literature or special books on speech development are perfect.

We can recommend such works as “The Living and the Dead Word” by Nora Gal, “From Adam’s Apple to the Apple of Discord” by Vadim Khrapp and “Alive as Life” by Korney Chukovsky.

There is a lot of worthy literature on the Internet, reading which will help you improve your speech and expand your vocabulary.

Retelling what you read can increase efficiency. Just ask someone to monitor how correctly and consistently you present the text.

As you read, you will come across interesting quotes. We recommend writing down the ones you especially like in a notebook so that you can re-read them and remember them from time to time.

In addition to books, social networks are also teeming with clever phrases and excerpts from books. It doesn’t matter where the quotes come from, it’s much more important to remember them.

In the right situation, your brain will tell you who is worth quoting. Such a sudden coloration of speech can turn your words into a real masterpiece of oratory.

On the issue of speech defects

Beautiful speech is inextricably linked with expressive and clear pronunciation. Burr, stuttering, and difficulty pronouncing certain letters correctly create difficulties when communicating. It is mistakenly believed that these problems must be solved in childhood. Allegedly, if a person does not develop correct speech with a speech therapist at an early age, then the help of a specialist will be useless.

In fact, modern speech correction techniques are successfully applied to adults. The main thing is to contact an experienced speech therapist-defectologist who is familiar with the field of neurology and neurophysiology. He must have medical knowledge in the field of pathopsychology of speech.

Such a specialist will evaluate all physiological aspects of word pronunciation:

• Muscle tone;
• Articulation;
• Features of breathing.

Next, he will select exercises that will gradually eliminate the defect.

Exercises to help develop speech

They will help people at any age, no matter if they are a first-grader or a man in adulthood.

1. Find a speaker whose speech you like . You should listen to and analyze several of his speeches. So you will notice what techniques he uses. The most suitable ones should be taken into account. Just be sure to test them when communicating with friends. This way you will see whether they work in your case, and correct your speech if necessary.
2. Communication with yourself. When no one is around, try to prove something to yourself. Argue a little, putting forward different theories. This will help you quickly find the necessary words and thoughts when communicating with others.
3. Make up short stories . Take 5 different words as a basis. Then make up a short story with them. This exercise develops logic and trains imagination.

Popular mistakes in speech

Common speech errors include:

• "Dress." For some reason, many people “put on” coats and other clothes when talking. While the correct thing to do would be “ put on .” “Dress” is used to mean dressing another person, for example, dressing a child;
• "It's ringing." A cultured person will certainly be offended by the erroneous emphasis in this word. To remember the correct pronunciation of “ringing”, you can use the association with the word “stench”. That is, a complete stench emanates from the “ringing”;
• “What time is it?” There is an erroneous choice of case here. So next time ask passers-by a question like this: “What time is it?”

It turns out that to develop a beautiful speech you will have to make a lot of effort. But people who improve their communication skills notice that at the same time their thinking has improved, they began to solve important problems faster.