Finding Ways Around Your Limits

One elderly couple is visiting another for supper. The two women go into the kitchen for a moment, leaving the men to talk. One of the men says to the other, "The Mrs. and I went to the nicest restaurant last night." "Is that right?" the other inquires, "What was it called?” "That's just it," he replies "I can't recall.” [1]

For many of us, memory might not be our strength. I, like the man in the story, have never been one to claim that memory was my strongest suit, yet nevertheless I was able to have significant success in extemporaneous speaking, an event based on the ability to remember a large quantity of information in a short period of time. So how exactly was I able to do this?

Well, let’s first backtrack a bit. Around my senior year, I realized something about extemp: consistency is the key to success. While you can be capable of giving a great speech one round, unless you can duplicate that performance round after round, it is unlikely you will have success at a large tournament, such as NFL nationals, where a successful student will compete in over 10 rounds.

Many pundits in extemp adamantly believe that the speech shouldn’t be overly formulaic and pre-prepared, claiming that this takes away from the academic value of extemporaneous speaking; I tend to disagree. In my personal opinion, the academic value of extemp isn’t derived from creating a revolutionary new format each time, but instead through entering unique and specialized analysis in each speech.

The average individual is only capable of remembering something in their short-term memory for 18 seconds, according to most psychological studies. The only way to remember things beyond this 18-second barrier is to rehearse the information, allowing it to be kept in “storage” for a longer period of time. Further, your retention of information decreases linearly within the first hour that you rehearse it. So how do you give a fluid and memorized sounding speech knowing that you can only memorize a limited amount of information? The keys are consolidation of information and the development of pre-arranged introductions.

Rather than trying to memorize “seven minutes of information”, try to simply memorize a set of amount of points you desire to make. The best way to do this is break down the speech into parts and see how much time you want to allocate for each section. It might sound simple but so many times extempers don’t take this vital first step, and as a result feel overwhelmed with the concept of speaking for seven full minutes. Here is an example of how I broke down my speeches:

When you look at it this way, it is really not nearly as daunting. You need to spend about a minute and a half in the introduction, a good deal of which is dominated by the attention getting device. Next, you put your best point first. The reason behind this, at least in my opinion, is because generally judges are apt to make their opinion about you as a speaker and commentator at the very beginning of the speech. Thus, if you put you weakest and shortest point first, you do yourself much more damage than if you put it last and make a good first impression.

It is also important that you try to keep the same basic format for each speech. It will allow you to formulate ideas much more clearly and the structure will become second nature as you do it more often.

During my senior year, I became known on the extemp circuit as the “Joe Millionaire Guy” because in my two biggest rounds at TFA state, I chose to use what I felt was the most applicable and strongest introduction available to me. So, in TFA state semifinals and finals, I chose to use the same introduction each time. The tactic got to me finals and helped me succeed. Nevertheless, many would see this as cheap; I completely disagree. The bottom line is that almost every extemper in state finals and national finals has an array of pre-arranged introductions that they can use at different times. It is never good to rely on only one introduction, but having a set of 5-6 introductions that you use at different times is a very efficient way to not be too contrived and greatly enhance fluency at the beginning of your speech.

It is a good idea to use humor and make the introduction something in popular culture, a joke, and generally not a personal story. Here is my example:

(AGD) FOX has always been the champion of quality television, whether it be a show in which supermodels are forced to work in foreign farm labor jobs, or whether it be a show in which average Americans compete for the opportunity to be publicly embarrassed by Simon Cowell. But perhaps FOX’s classiest show came in the fall of 2003 when a handful of women fought for the heart of one supposed millionaire. After weeks of fighting for his heart, one woman was crowned the winner and was allowed to marry the man, only to be told one small detail: The man whose heart she had won was in fact not a millionaire, but a construction worker who made 17,000 dollars a year.

(LINK) Now in the example of Joe Millionaire, the women involved in the show felt as if they were deceived by the FOX corporation, led to believe one thing only to find out that what they believed was in fact false. While the marriage between Joe Millionaire and his spouse might have been unsuccessful, a similar marriage of sorts, the marriage between the British Labour Party and populous of the UK will likely have a similar outcome. While it might be true that, according to the Economist of January 23^rd 2005, Tony Blair’s Labour party was successful in the parliamentary elections even after the war in Iraq, nevertheless, as we analyze this area in greater detail and ask ourselves, “How has the war in Iraq affected the Labour Party in the UK?”, we discover that Joe Millionaire serves as a clear example. Just as the women on the television show felt deceived and lost trust in the FOX company, so have the British people lost trust in the Labour Party as a whole. To understand why, we can look back at the example of Joe Millionaire and thus the acronym JOE.

In that example, I was able to tie a generic introduction to the topic while trying to be clever and use catchy words like “marriage” to associate the relationship between the TV characters and that between the British people and their government.

The other advantage of using something like the acronym to arrange your three points is that it is easier not only for the audience to follow your organization, but it is easier for you to remember your three points. Each letter serves as a reminder of where you are in the speech.

The key is finding 5 or 6 generic introductions that can be applied to a vast array of topics. In other words, make the intros broad enough that they could be applicable to many different topics with only minor moderations. That allows you to use the same intro for many different speeches.

For example, if I got a topic about President Fox of Mexico, I could use the same intro and change the link only slightly. Instead of talking about the deception regarding the war in Iraq, I could say that just as the women on the show felt deceived, many of the Mexican voters felt that his failure to eliminate the PRI from local politics was a comparable example of deception.

In the end, all you need to do is think of 5-6 introductions, think of what themes are applicable for these introductions. Then when you select a topic, relate the topic back to one of these generic introductions. This gives your speech a more unifying message or theme as well as helps your thoughts stay more organized throughout.

So in the end, no one person can memorize an entire speech during the 30-minute draw period. In the world of extemp, having a pre-arranged format or outline for your speeches as well as a set of pre-prepared introductions takes out about half of the memorization, leaving you more time to focus on memorizing the recommended seven sources for each speech.

"That's just it," he replies "I can't recall.” "Say, what's the name of that red flower that has thorns all over it?"  "A rose?" he responds. "YEAH, THAT'S IT!" he says energetically. He then whirls around and yells into the kitchen, "Hey, Rose! What was the name of that restaurant we went to last night!?" [2]

Sometimes you have to find ways around our limits. Good luck to everyone at UIL Regionals, UIL State, NFL Districts, and NFL Nationals.