The purpuse of the pause in educational communication
Educational Communication
SZ6612 EDUCATIONAL COMMUNICATION
SZ6638 EDUCATIONAL COMMUNICATION

What is „pause“
 Work with worksheets


Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 1
 Add emphasis to key points
 A pause before, during or after you say something you wish to emphasise can be a powerful verbal
tool in a presentation.
 When preparing your speech, make a note of the important phrases and plan pauses around them.
 Try and spread these throughout your presentation and ensure you practice so you’re not trying
them on the fly.
 Don’t be afraid to pause for up to 3 seconds and remember time seems to pass quicker when you are
on stage.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 2
 Indicate a change in tone or topic
 Pausing between two different parts of your talk can tell the audience something new is starting.
 You can also do this after an introduction or  before conclusion to help the audience understand
the progression through your speech.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 3
 Make sentences clear
 A brief pause every time your script has a comma between sections in a list, and a longer pause
when there's a hard stop to a sentence, will slow you down and let the audience hear what you are
saying.
 It also gives them time to process the information, particularly useful if your speech is on a
complex topic or if the audience’s native language isn’t the same as your presentation.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 4
 Recall what you want to say
 A pause lets you do this without the audience knowing or you having to apologies for forgetting
what to say next, breaking you’re audience's concentration.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 5
 Replace a filler or hesitation word
 There is nothing wrong with the occasional hesitation word, as long as it’s not used too
frequently.
 If you find yourself overusing a certain word (common words include ‘like’, ‘and’, ‘so’) during
your preparation, try a pause and a mental, not verbal, um.
 Recording your voice while practicing, using either a mobile phone voice recorder or even virtual
reality, will help you identify your filler words.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 6
 Distribute eye contact
 This again adds emphasis to the point you have, or are just about to, make.
 If the audience is large, spend 1-2 seconds giving eye contact to several different areas of the
audience before continuing.
 This helps keep the audience engaged and feel involved in the presentation.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 7
 Let the applause finish
 If your speaking at a large venue, you’ll most likely be applauded when you come on the stage.
  Make sure you pause long enough for the applause to finish – particularly if the event is being
recorded, such as at a TED talk.
 This ensures clapping won’t down out your important opening line.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 8
 Wait for the audience to stop laughing
 If you've told a joke and its gone down well (not always the case!), a pause lets the audience
calm down before you carry on with your speech.
 Comedians are of course very good at this, usually waiting a couple of seconds after the applause
has finished to build suspense for the next section.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 9
 Let others talk
 If you’re having a conversation at a networking event, negotiation, or even giving a sales pitch,
make sure you pause regularly to give the other person a chance to ask questions about the topic or
to clarify what you have said.
 This way, you’ll find out what the other person requires / wants / interests are and these can
guide the conversation to a mutually positive outcome.
 Read more on active listening and exercises to improve your skills in this area.

Effective Ways to use Pauses in Speech 10
 Think of a response to a question
 There's a formula to answering questions:
  Listen, understand (this is the pause), answer.
 The pause allows you to hear the complete question and gives you time to think of a suitable
answer.
 You don’t want to be interrupting the question and giving an incorrect answer – this can be highly
embarrassing.

Pauses in a speech - why
 Discussion – student presentation


Pause in a speech - when
 Discussion – student presentation


Pause in a speech - how
 Discussion – student presentation


Pause in educational communication
 Discussion – student presentation


Resources
 https://virtualspeech.com/blog/effective-ways-use-pauses-in-speech