Speech
The MTEL Speech test asks you to show command of communication theory and the classroom practice of speaking and listening. Expect items on the transactional model, interpersonal perception and listening, group dynamics, speech preparation and delivery, media literacy, and how a speech program is organized and assessed. Scenario items dominate: you are usually asked to diagnose a speaker or a lesson rather than recite a definition.
Core rules and concepts
- Models: Shannon–Weaver (linear: sender, channel, receiver, noise) versus the transactional model (simultaneous senders–receivers, feedback, shared field of experience).
- Nonverbal codes: kinesics (body movement), proxemics (Hall's intimate, personal, social, public distances), paralanguage/vocalics, chronemics, haptics, oculesics.
- Listening types: discriminative, comprehensive, critical, empathetic; active listening uses paraphrasing and perception checks.
- Organization patterns: chronological, spatial, causal, topical, problem–solution, and Monroe's motivated sequence (attention, need, satisfaction, visualization, action).
- Argument: Toulmin's claim–data–warrant–qualifier; rhetorical appeals ethos, pathos, logos.
- Delivery modes: extemporaneous (outline-driven, conversational) is the classroom default; manuscript and memorized risk poor eye contact; impromptu means no preparation.
- Media theory: agenda-setting (McCombs & Shaw), cultivation (Gerbner), uses and gratifications (Katz), gatekeeping, two-step flow.
Worked example
A student's persuasive speech on later school start times opens with "I'm going to talk about sleep," lists five studies, and closes "so that's my speech." Diagnosis: no attention device, no proposition, no call to action, and the studies are never orally cited. Rewrite using Monroe's sequence: a vivid attention step (a 6:45 a.m. bus story), a need step with one cited statistic, a satisfaction step naming the policy, a visualization of the improved term, and a specific action step (petition the school committee).
Traps
- Equating hearing with listening; hearing is physiological, listening is active and can be empathetic or critical.
- Labeling a speech informative when it asks the audience to act - that makes it persuasive.
- Treating noise as only loud sound; noise is any interference, including bias and jargon.
- Swapping cultivation (long-term media shaping of worldview) with agenda-setting (media telling us what to think about).
- Calling pathos "ethos" - ethos is speaker credibility.