The most popular impromptu speaking template is the PREP. This stands for stating your Point, Reasons, Evidence or Example and Point again. Let me take them one after the other.
Point
You state your point confidently and fully. This is better done if you go straight to the point (pun intended). Here, it serves no purpose to beat about the bush. In my recent article entitled “Get to the Point,” I wrote:
“Learn from journalists. Get to the point. News writers give you all the information you need in the first paragraph. That is why if they want to cut anything, they cut from the end. The assumption is that all the vital things have been written or said in the beginning.”
- Painful tales from Bida college that produced IBB, Abdulsalam, Vatsa, Sani Sami, others
- NIGERIA DAILY: Anambra decides
So this structure requires you to state your point clearly and then move to the reasons why. So that if you had unsettled your audience with your point, the reason section should begin to convince them to agree with your point of view. After all, the main purpose of communication is to change people’s minds.
Reasons
Here you mention the reasons for your point. You can share what science says, or what experts say or what the scriptures say. I count these as the three primary sources of extraction of reasons or premises.
Evidence /Example
This section is where you present your evidence to support your point.
Reasons and Evidence sections can be confusing. Because they are similar. Therefore, I prefer to give examples here. So if you have any evidence add it to the reasons section. The speech is yours and you can tweak it as you want. So here you should preferably give real-life examples. What examples can you think of as related to you or someone you know or read about in the news?
Point
To conclude, restate your point again and explain why it is important. While the first point was used to introduce your speech, the second point and the last section of the template is to provide a conclusion.
Example:
Say you are asked to speak at a party celebrating a teacher and your colleague who is leaving your school.
Point
“Hadiza has been a great teacher and her leaving this school is a great loss to the students and the teachers.”
Reasons
“I have three reasons why I said we are going to miss her. One, she was always the first to finish any task assigned by the management. Also, she is one of the most creative teachers in the school. Her classroom is beautiful and the students are super engaged in the class because they have fun while learning. This brings me to my final reason: she has won the best teacher award back to back for three years.”
Examples
“I remember when we were asked to update some records together. We were given two weeks to submit but I felt the time was too short because the primary duties alone take up the entire day. So I was surprised when Hadiza finished her own in a week! I’m sure she spent sleepless nights doing it.
“Also, you can tell that she is making an impact on students lives because she is usually one of the three teachers that ex-students mention as having the most impact on their lives.”
Point
“So we are going to miss her – terribly. All of us: students, staff and parents. It would be difficult to replace her. Because she comes with a set of unique qualities. There is no teacher like her, not even a bad copy. We wish her the best in her future.”
So PREP is a handy tool you can use to give a robust speech even if you have only two minutes of preparation. Simply state your point, reasons, examples and point again.
While I created some of the nine techniques in this book and repurposed some, PREP can be found in most impromptu books and courses.
PS:
This is the last of the nine impromptu speaking techniques I shared in my book “Impromptu Speaking Genius: 9 Structures to Moving the Crowd and Speaking without Fear.”
If you have been following the structures, which is your favourite? Which is the simplest?
