4.2 Describing and persuading
When you prepare a talk, you need to structure your main points to help your audience follow what you are saying. The way you do this will depend on the purpose of your talk. Your structure will be different if you are:
describing an experience or a series of events
persuading people by presenting your case.
Describing
Imagine that you have been asked to talk to a group of new employees to tell them about your job as a nurse. The main part of your talk could be organised under these five headings:
Background information about the hospital or surgery
What goes on in the department
Details of your work
What you most enjoy about your work
What you dislike about your job.
Persuading
However, if your talk is to persuade, you need to adopt a different structure for your main points, such as this:
Background
Other people’s arguments
Problems with other people’s arguments
Your arguments
Benefits of your arguments.
Here is an example based on persuading people not to smoke.
General background to smoking
Why smokers enjoy smoking
Evidence of damage to health
Cost of smoking to individuals and the NHS
How to give up smoking easily.
Activity _unit2.4.2 Activity 16 Deciding on the main points of a talk
Imagine you work for the NHS and are planning to give a talk persuading people to donate blood. Write down some headings for your talk to show how you would structure your argument.
Discussion
You could include any or all of the following:
General information about giving blood – how to make contact with the Service and where donor sessions take place.
Some of the ideas people have about giving blood.
Putting the facts straight – what actually takes place.
A case study about an individual donor.
The benefits to both individuals and the NHS.