This year saw a well contested speaking competition culminate in some emotive speeches from Year 7 on a range of Environmental issues ranging from plastic pollution, bee population decline to global warming.

As we watched, the judges were so impressed by the quality of the speakers across the tutor groups. I think it is a real testament to both the students’ and teachers’ work during this unit that each group were clear, engaging and sophisticated. This was a clear culmination of the skills they have learnt this year and bodes well for the years ahead. As we said at the end of the event, there were multiple teams and students who we considered for the winning awards.

Our final decision was to award Best Overall Group to 7O1’s speech on ‘Bees and The Collapsing Ecosystem’. While delighted with the choice to go the extra mile with bee headdresses and props, it was the actual speech and its delivery that clinched it for this group. Introductory speaker Keziah Mackannan was incredibly clear, utilising both engaging imagery and refined, emotive vocabulary. She set out the argument that we were going to hear and introduced her peers in her group. All of the judges felt that this gave 7O1 a very confident and comfortable start. From here, the two main speakers Rosie Burns and Alex Brickett built on this and both delivered excellent speeches. I was particularly taken with Alex’s inclusion of her own personal anecdote about her own actions to save a bee in need. There is a real case for these persuasive speeches to remember to give specific, relatable examples as well as the larger emotive moments. Poppy Ludlow then closed the speech effectively, with a tremendous call to action to her listeners. Another element that tipped this team into the top position was a very marked awareness of audience. They spoke of a large, global issue but were able to make this directly applicable to the lives of Year 7. Additionally, having a sprinkling of bee puns throughout was a charming addition that again spoke to considering how best to engage their audience – and an English teacher judge is always going to be swayed by ‘To Bee or not to Bee’! A very strong start to the event.

As we continued the speeches remained at a very high standard. We awarded Best Introductory Speaker to Haris O’Kelly (7S2) who opened his team’s speech on Plastic Pollution superbly. Most notably, Haris spoke with no notes and instead looked at the audience for the entirety of his opening (a daunting thing when the audience is the rest of Year 7!) and spoke with real maturity. It was immediately felt we were listening to an expert and as we noted in our award of his Best Introductory Speaker, Haris also crafted some lovely imagery of this issue at hand. A few other speakers also spoke without or with very little use of their written prompts. While not necessary, we noticed that it allowed these students to utilise more of their skills in varying tone and body language.

Best Main Speaker was given to Georgie Gray (7G1) who spoke with a calm confidence. While there were many speakers that could have claimed best speaker, a lot of them didn’t quite have the depth of ideas that Georgie delivered. Again, Georgie had a good awareness of her audience, deploying personal pronouns in a very judicious way. Finally, Best Concluding Speaker went to Petru Tulbure (7O2) who both opened and closed his team’s speech on Habitat Loss. Similarly to Haris, Petru spoke to us with maturity and confidence and was a delight to listen to. Petru had a control of his voice and was able to vary his tone to emphasise his points. It should also be noted that 7O2 did integrate the rest of the team within this conclusion which the judges felt was an interesting variation.

Overall, a fantastic event that demonstrated real strength across Year 7. Well done!

Finally, it should be noted that this was David Sharkey’s last Public Speaking Competition. The event has been helmed by his excellent leadership for a long time. We shall miss his particular style of steering us through the different topics and speeches. It will not quite be the same next year without him, and we will miss him tremendously!

Miss C Hall

English teacher