TAILIEUCHUNG - Speaking and Dictating
when you're trying to impress someone at a cocktail party, you'll probably try to speak in complete, grammatical sentences. if you lose your train of thought in the middle of a phrase, your new acquaintance might look at you strangely. | 13 Speaking and Dictating When you’re trying to impress someone at a cocktail party, you’ll probably try to speak in complete, grammatical sentences. If you lose your train of thought in the middle of a phrase, your new acquaintance might look at you strangely. Talking to the computer is a different matter. The computer doesn’t care about your grammar or word choice, or even if you stop speaking for minutes at a time. Most of us have had limited experience conversing with our little gray boxes—besides cursing at them when they crash. To speak effectively with NaturallySpeaking, you’ll need to unlearn old habits and gain new skills. 145 146 S PEAKING AND D ICTATING How to Speak to NaturallySpeaking Speak Clearly In conversation, people tend to mumble and slur words together, knowing others will still understand what they say. If you say ”Jeet?” your friend will understand it as “Did you eat?” Computers, however, are less adaptable than people. To achieve accurate results from NaturallySpeaking you must speak clearly. Pretend you’re Dan Rather or Katie Couric reading the news, or imagine that you’re giving a presentation to a small group. You may end up speaking more loudly than usual, and that’s fine. For a useful exercise, see “Moving Your Mouth,” below. Moving Your Mouth Read out loud a sentence from this book. Make a point of slurring your words and mumbling. Then read the sentence again, clearly. Can you tell what you’re doing differently in these two readings? Make a big smile. Notice what it feels like to raise the corners of your mouth. Next, pucker up your lips and push them out, as if you’re making an exaggerated kiss. Notice the muscles around your mouth that make your lips move. Then, drag the corners of your mouth into a frown. Try reading the same sentence three more times—once smiling, once puckered-up, and once frowning. Did you notice a difference in sound quality? Pitch? Clarity? Now let your jaw relax. Gently massage your jaw muscles, your temples,
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