TED Talks: The Official TED Guide to Public Speaking
by Chris Anderson
TED's curator explains how talks are built at TED: finding an idea worth sharing, choosing a throughline, and using narrative, explanation, or persuasion. Covers scripting versus notes, memorization, nerves, and slide decisions, with dissections of specific TED talks.
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More resources on TED Talk Style
duarte.com
Duarte is a premier presentation design firm that helps individuals and teams craft persuasive slide decks through design, storytelling coaching, and training services. The site offers information on their services, case studies, speaking engagements, and resources such as articles and books on presentation design.
toastmasters.org
Toastmasters.org is the official site of Toastmasters International, a nonprofit network that helps people improve public speaking and leadership through local clubs and a structured education program. It provides program descriptions, Pathways learning resources, club finder, event information, and practical tips for speeches and leadership development.
The secret structure of great talks
Eighteen-minute TEDxEast talk where Duarte diagrams the shape shared by 'I Have a Dream' and the iPhone launch. Watching it gives you the sparkline model, contrast between present reality and a better future, as a drafting tool.
The Official TEDx Speaker Guide
TED's own seven-step guide given to every TEDx speaker: get familiar with the form, develop one idea, outline and script, build slides, rehearse, and deliver. Sets out the constraints and content rules TED actually enforces on stage.
Rhetoric: The Art of Persuasive Writing and Public Speaking
Harvard's James Engell dissects twentieth-century American speeches by King, Kennedy, Chase Smith and Reagan to show how argument, arrangement and style persuade. Covers logical fallacies; assignments include writing an op-ed and a short speech. It teaches transferable analysis (how a claim is structured, how appeals are sequenced, where fallacies enter) rather than delivery tips.
Dynamic Public Speaking
Arizona State University's eight-hour Coursera course, built around six modules and peer-reviewed assignments. You practice the elevator pitch, informative talk, storytelling and persuasive speech, and learn to match message type to communication goal.