Speaking about Autism

As I have always hated public speaking, but had to do it occasionally as part of my job, I developed a few coping strategies. I always have good visuals, to deflect a bit of attention from me. I like to move about a bit, it helps me not get into a 'rabbit in the headlights' mindspace. I write bullet points on cards, as my reading comprehension is much faster than I can convert written words into speech - so a full script is useless to me. I punch a hole in the corner of the cards and loop them together with string (if they are dropped, they stay in the correct order). I never do the 'look at one person and address everything to them' trick, which might work for allistics, but for me as an autistic, I much preferred regarding the audience as an amorphous blob.

I also find that good visuals/slides are very helpful. I usually brainstorm for the presentation and then once I have a rough plan, I roughly make some visuals/slides and I then start to practice giving the presentation and then finalise the slides and their order so that they help me in what I want to say. I tend to practice each slide/ bit until I am happy with it, making notes as I go along which I can then use later to help me when presenting.  By repeatedly practising it (and possibly also then writing down one version of how I say things and updating it as I keep going through- so essentially the script gets created based on what feels comfortable for me to say out loud), the presentation gets engrained in my head- then the script is there for emergencies/ if I get stuck. This is how I approach presentations, but I think different people approach it in very different ways so not sure if this helps.

I'm not sure who I look at during presentations- definitely not a single person- I think I look at my slides a lot and then just somewhere beyond the audience... 

I also find that good visuals/slides are very helpful. I usually brainstorm for the presentation and then once I have a rough plan, I roughly make some visuals/slides and I then start to practice giving the presentation and then finalise the slides and their order so that they help me in what I want to say. I tend to practice each slide/ bit until I am happy with it, making notes as I go along which I can then use later to help me when presenting.  By repeatedly practising it (and possibly also then writing down one version of how I say things and updating it as I keep going through- so essentially the script gets created based on what feels comfortable for me to say out loud), the presentation gets engrained in my head- then the script is there for emergencies/ if I get stuck. This is how I approach presentations, but I think different people approach it in very different ways so not sure if this helps.

I'm not sure who I look at during presentations- definitely not a single person- I think I look at my slides a lot and then just somewhere beyond the audience...