The population of college students contains an increasing number of students who are over 25 years old. Therefore, more adult-focused courses in communication are needed because adults tend to be interested in communication problems rather than communication subjects and value learning that makes use of their experiences. One model that fulfills…

The 32 sources in this annotated bibliography are compiled for those interested in the available resources concerning theory and practice in public speaking. The bibliography cites only books with comprehensive treatments of the art of public speaking and its background, the majority of the items being textbooks that have gone through at least one…

Noting that only a fraction of the articles in speech journals have been concerned with the history of speech education in the United States, this annotated bibliography provides a broad guide to the materials necessary for understanding that history. The 45 citations are organized in six sections concerned with: (1) historical background; (2)…

Issues involved in teaching and assessing communicative competence are identified and applied to adolescent native English speakers with low levels of academic achievement. A distinction is drawn between transactional versus interactional speech, short versus long speaking turns, and spoken language influenced or not influenced by written…

Intended as a guide for educators interested in developing oral communication programs, this booklet contains activities and assessment instruments for use at all grade levels from prekindergarten through senior high school. The first section presents activities designed to develop oral communication skills and check lists to assess those skills.…

Sexual harassment is widespread on college campuses across the United States and is a subject that merits sensitive and sensible discussion. Once they acknowledge the problem, speech communication professionals can become better informed about sexual harassment and ways of dealing with it, and commit themselves to responsible communicative action.…

Noting that while the literature clearly states a need for colleges and universities to teach students critical thinking skills from a liberal arts perspective, this paper points out that there are few descriptions of how these skills can be taught. Using the canons of classic rhetoric, the literature is reviewed to discover the skills that arise…

Those seeking or those who have obtained a communications degree often ask what they can do with their degree. Their quest for universal employment categories uniquely appropriate for communication majors is shaped by four beliefs: (1) content expertise is the primary asset the communication major brings to a potential employer; (2) communication…

Discusses five Supreme Court decisions that relate to the First Amendment and freedom of the press. Includes small group decision-making exercises and discussion questions focusing on these interpretations for use in a college speech communication class. (MH)

To determine whether gender differences exist in paralinguistic perception, 31 male and 59 female college students listened to an audiotape on which emotions were conveyed through ambiguous verbal statements and then indicated their perceptions of the conveyed emotions. Statistical analyses of the student responses in relation to students'…

Four treatment conditions were selected for a study examining the effects of immediate video feedback of oral assignments on group discussants' self-perceived anxiety, participants' satisfaction, and discussion quality. The subjects were 80 students enrolled in basic speech and business/professional speech communication courses. Twenty subjects…

A "gambit" is any of the hundreds of brief, idiomatic rejoinders, rhetorical phrases, or comments that are essential to fluent conversation. This textbook fosters familiarity with such phrases in English by encouraging their use in the carrying out of a series of provocative class exercises, including a handwriting analysis and a "love test."…

A survey of Illinois secondary school speech teachers was conducted in 1970 so that a profile of the secondary school speech teacher could be constructed from the perspective of how teachers view themselves. Replies were received from 55 teachers representing 37% of the sample and 12% of Illinois schools with speech activity programs. Among the…

TEN EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSES RELATED TO THE CONTROL OF SPEECH PRODUCTION AND PERCEPTION WERE REPORTED. THE ANALYSES WERE CONCERNED WITH THE DIFFERENTIAL EFFECTS OF STIMULI AND REINFORCEMENTS ON SPEECH PRODUCTION AND THE DISCRIMINATORY PERCEPTION OF SPEECH. INITIAL SPECIFICATIONS WERE INCLUDED FOR A SPEECH AUTOINSTRUCTION DEVICE TO BE USED FOR…

Every five years the Speech Communication Association supports a nationwide survey of the basic course in speech at institutions of higher education in the United States. The surveys seek to reflect the current conditions of the course in terms of instructional practices, staffing, administration, and course content. While these surveys are of…