BREAKING UP SPEECHES
OVERVIEW
OBJECTIVES
Good speeches are not simply well-written
essays read out at speed. It is important to
consider where in a speech we pause and how
pauses can change the impact and even the
meaning of a speech. This exercise gives
students the chance to consider these issues
and practise implementing them.
TASK
• To understand the importance of
choosing and noting pauses in
speeches
• To practise preparing and delivering
a speech with pauses for emphasis
RESOURCES
Some short paragraphs of text from a
Whether slow or fast, speakers who deliver
newspaper or similar. See appendix for
their remarks in a constant, monotonous way
samples.
are unengaging to listen to. Choose some
famous speeches or pieces of rhetoric and see
how engaging the class finds them when
delivered without pauses!
Write the sentence ‘Amanda said David has done badly on the test’ up on the board.
Now we are going to break this up in different ways. Ask one volunteer to read
‘Amanda
Said David
Has done badly on the test’
And another to read
‘Amanda said David
Has done badly
On the test.’
See if the class can come up with any more different inferences by breaking the sentence up
in other ways. Point out that the pauses we put into speeches aren’t necessarily just about
grammar, pauses are often put in ‘ungrammatical’ places and sound good.
Now students are going to have a chance to do practise this more themselves. Give students a
short paragraph of text from a newspaper or similar source (some examples are included at
the end of this resource.) In small groups students should experiment with different ways of
breaking up the text to deliver it. Once they are happy they should mark the text to remind
them where to pause. Apostrophes and slashes can both work well as pause markers.
Call on a few students to deliver their marked text to the room. Invite peer feedback on their
choices – what could they have done differently?
Tip – As an additional or alternative task, have students use a piece of their own writing to
break up and deliver. This can be used to help refine competition speeches, though beware of
over-practising and becoming wooden and unnatural.
APPENDIX
These are just a few examples of the sort of texts you might want students to practise on.
“Last week, a group of British parliamentarians wrote to Donald Tusk, the president of the
European Council, to ask him to safeguard the rights of Brits on the Continent. He said no.
Simultaneously, almost, Theresa May was being asked at prime minister’s questions to
safeguard the rights of Europeans in Britain. She said no, too. Or, as she put it, without a
reciprocal agreement from the other side, doing so “would have left UK citizens in Europe high
and dry”.”
Hugo Rifkind, The Times, 6/12/16
“Back in 1963, Disney had huge success with a project tapping into Polynesian culture. It
wasn’t a movie, but a theme-park attraction called the Enchanted Tiki Room that surrounded
visitors with singing animatronic birds. Amazingly, it’s taken 50 years for the studio to get
around to making a feature film based around the lore of the Pacific Islands. The good news is
that Moana was worth the wait. The bad news is that it does not have a single singing bird,
although there is a scene-stealingly idiotic chicken called Hei Hei.”
Empire Magazine 28/11/16
“The Football Association is expected to shortly announce the most lucrative kit deal in
England’s history, with Nike having agreed to pay in the region of £400m to make the national
team’s strip for a further 12 years.”
The Guardian, 7/12/16