Now in the final installment of this article we’re going to look at the most polarizing method to prepare any presentation, particularly for teaching. Scripting a training presentation.
And yes it is exactly what it sounds like. Writing a script—each and every word that you will deliver in a presentation or in this case your lesson.
By this definition this is an ‘extreme’ form of presentation preparation. It’s a method that demands that you either fully commit to being in (and you say everything you have written) or that you don’t write a single phrase and you choose to follow an organic or queued approach. No in between!
Under normal circumstances scripting is just one of those things you just . . . Don’t . . . do. And when I say that I mean—ever! In all of the time that I have ever been delivering training, I have never used a script . . . not once!
Being an awesome instructor means knowing your stuff; so your knowledge simply makes scripting redundant. You simply don’t need one!
Besides, imagine having an audience and rather than communicating with them completely—instead you spend your time reading from a script, or spitting out a bunch of words that you hope to remember from earlier.
Chances are it’s not a pretty mental picture. If you have an audience a script is the worst thing you can bring to the lesson.
But . . . What if there was a reason to have one?
It’s the 21st century, and teaching is not just something that happens face to face any longer. We are now in the digital age, and trainees, students and clients don’t . . . need to be in class at any specific time.
Teaching has changed – In fact a lesson can be delivered at one time, and received at another completely.
Scripts are useful—When it comes to recording your training. And they are useful for two key reasons. The first reason is all about this exact topic . . . preparation. Excessive preparation! The ‘scripting’ of each and every single word that you’re going to say, and there is benefit.
Particularly when recording, a script will provide the opportunity to seamlessly put together your lesson with everything you need to communicate without all of the nuances that we all have, that only come out when we speak naturally.
Secondly, scripting provides one massive final benefit when it comes to recording lessons. A script acts as version control when it comes time to update your lessons from one version to the next. The script is the written record, of what you have presented.
The script is easy to update and edit as required and when it comes to version control, a script is the most valuable method you can use to prepare any lesson you can deliver.