Categories: Law Practice Skills

Instructor(s)

Plum, Christina

Course Data

Course Description

Public Speaking for Lawyers (Oral Communication) – (LLM-LI Students)

Surveys reveal that effective oral communication skills, especially those used when giving presentations to lawyers and members of the public, are crucial skills for establishing and maintaining credibility as a lawyer. Public Speaking for Lawyers (Oral Communication) is an interactive, hands-on course designed to develop and improve students’ public speaking and oral communication skills. This one-credit course is currently offered for LLM-LI students and is offered pass/fail only.

The content of this course focuses on developing those core communication skills that all lawyers need and use in their practice. In this course students will work on:

• Developing and projecting self-confidence;
• Intentionally designing the content and structure of presentations; and
• Developing, through practice and observation, a reliable capacity to perform well in a variety of speaking situations.

This course will teach students strategies for effective public speaking to large and small audiences and individuals. Specific exercises include introducing a speaker to an audience; giving a persuasive speech; participating in a meeting; and giving a formal presentation of legal concepts to an audience. This course will emphasize that successful oral communication includes delivering a message to an audience that is intentional, understood, remembered and accepted (or at least respected).

log in