By Miss Gordon, Public Speaking Co-Ordinator

It has been a wonderfully busy and enjoyable term in Public Speaking and Debating. 

Initially, the focus was supporting students’ return to classrooms in September. Having had months of remote teaching, many students felt nervous and ill-equipped for speaking out in the classroom setting. For some, it was ‘over talking’, for others, it was challenging to speak out in any capacity. With this in mind, a series of workshops took place with pupils in Years 9, 10 and 12. There were taken off lessons from 8:30-1:15, and undertook a series of games, interactive tasks and mini seminars on how to find (and use!) our voices, both in lessons and ‘the real world’. Miss Gordon devised and ran these workshops with the whole year groups in their bubbles. This was then followed by hour sessions for those year groups plus Year 11, in which Miss Gordon gave a workshop on how to engage an audience in an online world (from technical wizardry, to voice control, background, sensory experience engagement, and body language – with cameras on and off!) This helped the students specifically in preparing for their ARTiculate presentations. The 1:1 coaching of individuals has continued in the lead up to national competitions (including ARTiculate with Alex Warren, ESU Mace, ICYD, ESU Churchill Public Speaking, SPGS and GDST Chrystall Carter Prize). 

When online teaching resumed in January, other initiatives were created, to help instill a greater sense of self-esteem and confidence in orally expressing themselves. The focus was helping students ‘keep talking’ during lockdown. Acknowledging the difficulties in speaking out (and staying motivated!) when spending large parts of the day looking at a screen, and on ‘mute’, the following initiatives took place:

Year 7 House Debate: Year 7 students partook in weekly debates, to win house points. This culminated in a Grand Final this week, which was recorded and then streamed to the whole of Year 7 to watch in Form Time.

Topics debated included: 

This House believes there is no need for printed press in the digital world.

This House believes that the superhero race must become extinct.

This House believes that personal liberty must be sacrificed for public security.

Books are always better than their film counterparts.

Society cannot thrive without religion.

The same initiative ran weekly for Year 8 students, with their final scheduled for a fortnight’s time.

For the first time this year, we had two teams represent NHEHS in the ESU’s Churchill Public Speaking Competition. They spoke on the pertinent topics of Is Democracy in Crisis? and We should cancel Cancel Culture. What was delightful was that both teams comprised students who were brand new to debating! They thoroughly enjoyed the experience and getting to meet other students equally passionate about developing their skills in rhetoric. These girls were so buoyed by their experience that they have created a new society at school, and have plans in place to do half-termly friendly debates with other schools. 

 ‘Speaking Society’ (for Year 12) is running a new initiative this year. Miss Gordon trained as a TedTed guide over the summer, and is now guiding a group of 10 Year 12 students in creating their own official TedTalk, which will be recorded and ‘put out’ on the internet. They meet weekly after school, and have started constructing extremely thought-provoking speeches on topics pertaining to the future of feminism, racial representation in literature, and why there is no plan B for climate change.

A team of 8 Year 12 students represented NHEHS at this year’s ESU MACE. They came runners up, leading a powerful and well-researched opposing argument on the motion: This House would introduce quotas for women on company boards.

Rhea Johri partook in the semi-final of the GDST Chrystall Carter Public Speaking Prize – speaking with great sensitivity on A global pandemic is exactly what modern society needed to wake us up and enact change. Including deeply personal testimony, Rhea was eloquent and articulate, persevering despite real technical issues on the night. 

Coming up on Saturday 20th  March is ICYD – the first time NHEHS have entered the  International Competition for Young Debaters 2021 – a Cambridge Union run competition. Four  teams of Year 9 and Year 10 students will partake for a full day of live debates. Their first motion is: This house would ban international aid charities from using sensational, graphic, or overly-emotional images of suffering in fundraising and advertising campaigns. ICYD is an annual competition in the British Parliamentary format (BP) for students below and including Year 10 (English school years).

Coming up in Summer Term we will be running Year 12 and Year 10 respective Model United Nations (with newly arrived trophies!) For the first time, Year 12 EPQ students will receive small group support from Miss Gordon to help them practise for the presentation element of the qualification. 

Looking forward to debating all together again next term!