Skip to Main Content

COM 1100: Informative & Demonstrative Speeches

What are Informative and Demonstration Speeches?

Informative speeches are given to increase knowledge on specific topic or subject and can be presented with or without persuasion.

Demonstration speeches are a type of informative speech that takes your audience through process or task, step by step. It shows you how to do something.

  • Uses words and visuals to teach or show how a process works from start to finish
  • Examples of Demonstration Speech topics might come from:
    • Everyday experiences - folding cloths, making a smoothie, throwing a football, using PowerPoint or an app
    • Crafts or Hobbies -paper airplanes, candles, knitting, making jewelry, personal care e.g. make up, nail polish, braiding hair
    • Ideas with food - marinating meat, making salad dressing, frosting a cake, rolling out a pie crust
    • Link to other ideas 

Key Points to Consider

The purpose of an informative speech is to INFORM!  This might be a process (e.g. How to make pancakes), an event (e.g. Earth Day's impact on the environment),or concept (e.g. What you need to know about space debris.)

The purpose of a demonstrations speech is to TEACH! This might be on how to perform a task  ( e.g. fold laundry), or process (e.g. editing photos on your phone) through step-by-step instructions.  By the end of the speech the audience should have a good understanding and feel confident to try it themselves.

Speech Topic Ideas

1.  Ted Talks

2. Current Events

3. Something you are passionate about (e.g. recycling, looking at the night sky)

4. Something you are good at (e.g. baking, barbequing)

5. Something you can make (e.g. scented candles, origami)

6. Something you do (e.g. skate boarding, throwing a baseball)