Tip or treat: October's top 10 tips

Readers chose the tips and treats they found on this blog in October, and I'm happy to share them with you in this monthly roundup of our most popular posts:

1. Should you use or lose the lectern? The focus of week 7 of our Step Up Your Speaking online coaching included this popular post with 3 video examples of women speakers demonstrating best practices, with or without a lectern. You can see online trainee Stephanie Benoit's thoughts on speakers and lecterns here.
2. Delivering her mother's eulogy was the challenge faced by one of The Eloquent Woman's fans on Facebook--and readers responded with their tips and advice.
3. How can I work on making eye contact? Stephanie asked in week 6 of our online coaching, and I responded with ways eye contact can get a speaker off-track.
4. Ignite! -- a speaking competition organized in cities around the U.S. -- inspired me to visit the Baltimore session held this month, and I featured two women speakers in this well-read post. One, a first-time speaker, is working on a guest post about her experience. Stay tuned!
5. To show Stephanie ways to connect with her audience, part of week 8 of our coaching, I took a tour of the FDR Memorial in Washington as inspiration for ways to better reach your listeners.
6. When did "um" become a dirty word? Michael Erard, author of the book , traces how speech disfluencies like um and uh went from normal to disparaged in this interview with our blog.
7. Do bullet points work in your slides? We featured a post from presentation blogger Olivia Mitchell that walks through the science of how audiences perceive bullets--and the answer is probably not as well as you think.
8. Using a prop to emphasize your point can underscore your message in a powerful way. This popular post gives you a video of a doctor discussing the H1N1 flu virus and its availability to see a great example, plus our tips.
9. The Eloquent Woman celebrated its 2-year anniversary in October with this roundup of our all-time-most-popular posts --a bagful of extra treats this month.
10. Prepping for a speech is like packing a suitcase, the focus of week 9 of my coaching with Stephanie. Getting ready without overpreparing is one of her top priorities, and this post packs a suitcase-full of tips.