After reading the passage below, answer the questions that follow. Be sure to "submit" your response for each question. You will initially receive full credit for each question, but your grade may change once your instructor reviews your responses. Be sure to check the grade book for your final grade.
Judging Speeches
At the beginning of this chapter, you read about the struggles that people with physical challenges (such as King George VI) face when delivering speeches. But how do culture and ethics collide when it comes time to actually judge or assign a grade to a presentation?
Imagine that your speech class is engaging in peer evaluation. In groups of six, you practice delivering your speech before the final presentation to the entire class. One woman in your group, Evelyn, has cerebral palsy, a neurological disorder that permanently affects body movements and muscle coordination. It can have a diverse number of symptoms, but Evelyn struggles most with slurred speech, balance, and exaggerated reflexes. Evelyn is quite comfortable talking about her disability and appears to be a confident speaker. Yet as she talks, you find it somewhat difficult to understand her speech. Because many of her words are slurred, you feel like you are missing a few main points. As much as you try not to, you find the fact that she sways when she speaks and that she must grip the back of her chair for balance somewhat distracting.
You feel bad making these comments to Evelyn on her first evaluation, and so you focus your remarks on improvements she can make on the outline. But you are worried about how the rest of the class will react to Evelyn and even what sort of grade she might get from your professor. You are now facing your second round of evaluations for Evelyn.