Most of us use notes to assist us when we are delivering a speech. Many Toastmasters leave their notes at the lectern and then proceed out from behind the lectern to give their speech. In this case, they have most of their speech memorized and they are just using their notes in case they forget something or get lost in their speech. If and when they forget something, they return to the lectern, glance at their notes and then continue with their speech.
On several occasions, I have seen Toastmasters have to go back to the lectern, turn pages, and then scrutinize those pages very closely before being able to continue where they left off. I have noticed that on these occasions, the Toastmaster was using the entire text of their speech as their notes. Their notes were not bullet points of the speech to jog memory; instead, every word of their speech was being used as notes.
I was surprised to see the use of 'full-text' notes. I don't recommend using the entire text of your speech as notes for the following reasons:
1) Using the entire text of your speech as notes makes it very hard to find your place in the speech when you have forgotten something. You have more pages of notes to look through and those pages are more densely packed with text.
2) Using the entire copy of the speech often forces you to put a greater emphasis on memorizing every word, as opposed to every thought you want to convey. This takes way from a fluid, natural speech.
I will emphasize this second point by example. Here is how I use point form notes which I believe helps to contribute to a more natural speech.
Let's say that part of my speech had a sentence as follows:
By participating in a fun and supportive Toastmasters group, you can become a better speaker and leader and gain confidence to succeed in whatever path you've chosen in life.
For this sentence, I would write a bullet point something like:
participating Toastmasters group -> better speaker, leader --> gain confidence to succeed chosen path
For me, the point of my notes is not to show me every word; it is just there to remind me of the key thoughts. When I read the above sentence fragments, if I know my speech well enough, these bullet points should be enough to trigger the temporarily forgotten thought.
When I deliver the speech, the sentence may come out as follows:
By participating in exciting and supportive Toastmaster groups, you will become a better speaker and leader, and you will gain the confidence to succeed in your chosen life path.
The sentence is just slightly different the original sentence in the full-text notes but it is a still an effective sentence - the sentence would also be delivered more naturally because I was not trying to recall the exact words from my full-text speech.
There are more advanced speakers that would encourage you to just take out the 8-10 bullet points that reminded you of the major thoughts in your speech. Here you have bullet points just for thoughts as opposed to individual sentences. I applaud these advanced speakers, but I myself am not there yet to confidently recall an entire speech from just 8-10 bullet points.
The advice above regarding using bullet points instead of a full-text speech does not apply to someone who is overly relying on their notes. If you don't know your speech very well, and you must (unfortunately) rely on reading your speech, full-text notes are likely necessary.
If you do know your speech fairly well and you are planning on using full-text notes, consider trying to summarize your speech into bullet points instead. This will give you less to look through should you need to use your notes, and it will also promote a more natural and fluid speech.
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