Structuring Oral Commentaries

So here's a bit of coaching for Oral commentaries. When you begin, take 30 seconds or so to lay out your plan. Anything that helps your listener develop a coherent understanding of your commentary is good, and laying out your plan would help with that.

I would think that right after this, you would try to put your passage in context. This should be brief, but don't assume the listener is familiar with your extract. Take the time to set it up well. For example, if you're talking about "A Little Cloud" don't just jump in talking about Little Chandler. You might mention that the main character is a man named Tom Chandler whose friends, according to the narrator, call him "Little Chandler". If you do this, you should set yourself up for talking about the character in general terms, then discussing how that characterization is evident in the extract.