PUBLIC SPEAKING! Makes me ILL!

Drivemycar · Newbie User Joined: Mar 30, 2008 Posts: 72

Do you all think public speaking should be allowed in schools? It doesn't develop any skills in my opinion...aside from worrying, anxiety, blushing...etc. I think it should be optional. So many of my teachers just assign presentations so they don't have to mark work or anything. Easier to watch 20 presentations than mark 20 homewrk assignments.

princess_haru · Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 5:20 pm Post subject:

I actually dropped out of college because of public speaking Embarassed

I skipped school a lot from the age of around 14 onwards because I was totally overwhelmed by depression, anxiety, social phobia and an eating disorder. When I started college at 16 I was still very unhappy, but determined to start afresh and work towards something other than self-destruction.

All it took was the threat of a five-minute speech on "something of importance to yourself" to make me lose it completely. I wrote a speech eventually, but couldn't stop picturing myself standing in front of the class stumbling over my words with their eyes all over me, judging me and mocking me. I skipped the lesson when the presentation was scheduled and from then on I fell back into old habits and spent less and less time at college. I'd dropped out within weeks.