Randy Harvey Toastmasters winning speech-writing technique: SCREAM
2004 World Champion of Public Speaking, Randy Harvey, mentored Ryan Avery right up to his 2012 Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking win!
SCREAM at Your Audience, Randy Harvey, DTM from District 25 Toastmasters on Vimeo.
Randy says the reason you want to master this SCREAM construct in your speaking is because:
You tell a STORY and make a POINT.
And the POINT that you make is a SCREAM construct.
This reminds me of 1999 World Champion of Public Speaking Craig Valentine’s advice to tell a story and make a point, where the POINT is a Foundational Phrase of 10 words or less.
S.C.R.E.A.M. Speech-writing construct
(S) Simile: A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two things through some connective, usually “like”, “as”, “than”, or a verb such as “resembles”. Randy’s examples: She was like a flower. He was like a stone.
(C) Contrast: Describing the difference(s) between two or more entities. Randy’s examples: light, dark; fat, skinny; short, tall.
(R) Rhyme: A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds in two or more words, most often at the end of lines in poems and songs. Standard rhyme: words rhyme at the end of the sentence. More powerful rhyme: internal rhyme, where words rhyme within the sentence.
(E) Echo (call-back): A reference that recalls a word, phrase, or sound in another text. Using part of a phrase in the first part of a sentence, and repeating it in the second part of a sentence. Randy’s example: “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”
(A) Alliteration: The repetition of sounds in nearby words, most often involving the initial consonants of words (and sometimes the internal consonants in stressed syllables). Example: lazy languid line.
(M) Metaphor: A figure of speech that relies on a likeness or analogy between two things to equate them and thus suggest a relationship between them. For example, in “A Far Cry from Africa” (1962) Derek Walcott portrays the continent as an animal, with a “tawny pelt” and “bloodstreams.” Randy’s examples: He is a lion. He is a bear. He is a rock. He is a gnarly-old craig of driftwood.
One of the most prominent examples of a metaphor in English literature is Shakespeare: “All the world’s a stage.” (This quote is a metaphor because the world is not literally a stage.)