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The Foundations of an Effective Voice

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Teaching Arts

Overview

In this lesson, we explore the sonic foundations of effective teaching voice, including cadence, tone, energy, and volume.

Objective

Understand the components of your voice and gain practical techniques for preparing before class and optimizing your voice while teaching.

What You'll Get

You'll discover that your voice is a powerful teaching tool beyond just the words you choose. This includes warming up your vocal cords for resonance and projection, preparing yourself to be present so your tone reflects embodiment, and channeling nervousness into excitement. You'll learn specific practices like breathing through a straw and using conscious breath to optimize how you sound. Whether you struggle with vocal fatigue or simply want to become more conscious of your delivery, you'll gain techniques for using your voice more effectively and sustainably.

Questions Answered Here

What are the sonic components of your voice?
What are some things you can do before class to optimize your voice?
If you feel apprehensive about teaching, what is a specific technique that can help?
Describe four practices you can use while teaching to optimize your voice.
Describe considerations related to the cadence and rhythm of your voice while teaching.

The Sonic Components of Voice

Here we will focus on the actual sonic aspects of your voice and how you can mindfully use them to refine your teaching. These are:

Cadence (e.g. intonation, inflection of the voice)
Tone (e.g. pitch, quality and strength of the voice)
Energy
Volume

You can learn to be more conscious about your voice while teaching. And there are things you can do to beforehand as well. See below for details.

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