Things have moved along fairly well. Students have selected their speech topic (everything ranging from gun control to bullying to dress code) and worked on their speeches (they are still in the rough draft mode). Aside from a complaint or two about my lack of editing their speech and fixing it for them (which was obviously followed by a conversation about personal responsibilities and how they need to work to make their speech better (the best part about this was when a student explained how if their speech was bad, it was their fault and not mine…go figure)).

We have started to finalize our speeches, polishing off some of the rough edges, and moved into the presentation part of our speech. Each student has started to present their speech to a different class partner; hopefully receiving (and using) feedback along the way.

We will have our final presentation of our speeches on one of three days: 3 students will present at our Soapbox event on February 20, a good chunk will present on February 21, and the remainder will present on February 24.

The speeches are coming along. Certainly ask for any of our students to share their topic and/or their speech. All speeches should be no longer than 2 minutes so you can get it done real quickly if you would like.