Welcome to Public Speaking and Debate! As active participants, students will learn the techniques for building and delivering a successful speech. Students will engage in delivering speeches, as well as, participate in debates. In addition, students will have the necessary skills to critique, analyze and question speeches and debates delivered by others. This course will develop and improve public speaking, argumentative and critical- thinking skills in communication settings. Students will prepare and deliver speeches and participate in several of in-class debates and forums on current topics. Techniques will be taught to control speech anxiety, and structure and organize information to present to a variety of audiences. As such, the fundamentals of physical and vocal delivery skills, use of language and gesturing, as well as, listening skills will be learned. Students will also have the opportunity to engage in debates with debaters from around the world using IDEA (International Debate Education Association - http://www.idebate.org/). This is a high school level course. Students will be expected to meet the expectations required by the County in order to earn high school credit. The student’s overall grade will appear on his or her high school transcript and will affect their high school GPA. If you would like to know more about the standards, pacing, and expectations of the course, please download the Course Description for Speech I below. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to contact me. The links on this page will allow you download Reading Notes, Assignments, and Project Information. Click on an item in the list below to view or download a document.