Sunday was a wonderful experience for our public speaking students. We had ten junior and four senior students participate in the Rostrum Voice of Youth Public Speaking Competition. It was a highly competitive day with schools from around Ballarat coming again to Loreto to participate.
Laine Ballinger, Eliza Dodd, Olive Lanyon and Jemima Knobel won their first heat and moved forward to the finals of the day in the Junior division. Jemima Knobel was the winner with a speech titled ‘Blue Skies’ which discussed happiness and the need for a range of emotions to exist. Her impromptu speech entertained the audience about why she loves ‘Summer’ (it was mainly due to the gluten free fish and chip shop in Cobram). The ‘Runner up’ was Olive Lanyon who passionately spoke to the audience about the need to educate women in her speech title ‘Changing the Narrative’. Her impromptu speech had everyone laughing as she outlined why she hated ‘Summer’.
Our seniors were equally as successful with Lucy Eales winning and moving through to the state final with her speech ‘Practice makes Perfect’ which dealt with her struggles with being a perfectionist. Annmary Chalakkal was the ‘Runner up’ with a wonderful speech titled ‘Changing the Narrative’ which discussed the complexities of being an activist via social media.
Jemima and Lucy will present another prepared and impromptu speech on June 19 at the State Final in Melbourne. We wish them every success.
