Graduation Speech Examples: 5 Student Speech Videos With A Purpose

Graduation speech examples are vast. You can structure a speech to enter a contest, to mark an occasion, to motivate people, or to demonstrate something just to name a few. With so many options available, it may be hard to decide which format is the most appropriate for your speech.

With graduations happening now and over the next few weeks we thought it would be helpful to show some great graduation speech examples that exemplify the purpose of a speech. Whether you are valedictorian, a club member, or simply just thanking everyone for helping you graduate you can take some great tips away from these graduation speeches.

Graduation Speech Examples: Purpose of a Speech

First and foremost, when it comes to giving speeches, there are some foundational things to keep in mind when crafting your speech. The first thing to keep in mind is the purpose of your speech. The purpose refers to the intention of your speech. Is the intention of your speech to inform, to persuade, or to entertain? Determining the purpose of your speech will help you craft the tone of your speech. Once you determine the purpose of your speech, you can focus on crafting it.

But what are the differences between the three purposes? Let’s take a look.

Graduation Speech Examples: Informative Speech

Let’s start with an informative speech. An informative speech is exactly as it sounds! Its purpose is to inform the audience. An important thing to remember about an informative speech is that there is no bias. The main purpose of the speech is simply to give the audience information. It is up to the audience to decide what to do with the information. The speech is not trying to persuade the audience in any way. Typically, these speeches involve references to data, charts, and infographics to help support the speech. Many informative speeches may seem a bit dull,  but that shouldn’t suggest that all informative speeches have to be. Check out this informative speech on managing time.

Tip: Informative speeches are exactly as they sound, informative. These types of speeches are not meant to persuade or entertain, but to give the audience strictly information. It is up to the audience to decide what information they take away from the speech and if they will put that knowledge to use or discard it. These types of speeches generally do better with visual aids. 

Graduating Speech Examples: Entertaining Speech

Entertaining speeches are meant to entertain! Keeping in mind the structure of a speech, adding the extra layer of entertainment is a sure way to make your speech memorable. Entertaining speeches do not have to follow a traditional format of a speech, but their purpose should still satisfy the prompt while delivering the message in a unique way.

These two graduation speech examples do a great job of addressing the prompt in a unique way that fits the orator’s personality.

For our first example, let’s look at this video. In this video, this 9-year old student adds humor into her speech. Taking creative liberties with her speech, she manages to take a lighter tone on why she feels having a Win-Win attitude is the solution to people working together.

With this next example, a 5-year old gave quite the speech on what it means to be a leader. He clearly provides examples within his speech about the qualities, he feels, that inhabit a leader. He even has anecdotes in his speech to provide further support in his speech.

Tip: When giving an entertaining speech, don’t be afraid to let your personality shine through! Remember, this speech’s purpose is first to entertain the audience on your topic of choice. Anecdotes can be a great bolster to this type of speech. 

Graduating Speech Examples: Persuasive Speech

Last, but not least, is the persuasive speech. This type of speech is one of the more common ones as a persuasive speech is firstly meant to persuade the audience to a particular mindset. Usually, these speeches focus on a topic or issue that matter greatly to the orator. For a graduation speech, you may choose to take the time to shift some attention to an issue or topic you feel passionate about. Whether the topic is climate change or women’s rights, take your time persuading your audience.

These two speech videos do a fantastic job of persuading the audience to help solve the problem presented.

In this example, this student is trying to persuade the audience to take action. She speaks loudly, clearly, and slowly. She emphasizes the topic of her speech by repeating the line, “you are never too young” throughout.  In this case, she is trying to persuade the audience to believe that people are never too young to voice their opinions and stand up for what they believe in. She sets examples of this by demonstrating her own bias in topics that she is passionate about. Let’s take a look.

As if to provide support for the belief demonstrated above, this 5-year old student does a spectacular job of demonstrating a persuasive speech on a topic she is passionate about. In this case, the student is giving a speech on, “reduce, reuse, and recycle”. Her topic would fall under an Earth-friendly theme. While her age may distract some of the audience, she compensates for this by using visuals and signs to support her speech further.

Tip: When it comes to persuasive speeches, speaking slowly and clearly is a necessity. The audience needs time to process what you trying to communicate.  Use visuals to support your speech. Don’t be afraid to take your time and find alternate ways to exemplify your topic in addition to the speech. 

Once you have decided on the purpose of your speech, you are now ready to craft your speech. Crafting your speech is easier if you pick a topic that is personally important to you. Once you pick your topic, you can then focus on the type of speech you want to give. Remember, we are talking about the purpose of speeches in this article. There are many more variations of types of speeches to give examples on, but that’s another article.