Public Speech: School Shootings

Hey, this is my half finished speech for school. It's not done yet, but I thought I'd post it to see what you guys think!!!! =) I worked really hard on it and done a lot of resheach, so please don't come on and say the facts aren't true!!!
Thanks!!!! Here it is!!!!:



"Massacre at Columbine", "Terro at Tech".

Good morning teachers and fellow students. My name is Kelsey Howlett and today I am going to talk to you about the school shootings that have taken place in the United States in the past serval years.

School shotings is a well used term in both American and Canadian media to describe gun violence at an education institution, epically the mass murder or spree killing at people of the institution. A school shooting can be perpetrated by one or more students, expelled, faculty members or an outsider.Unlike acts of revenge against certain people, school shootings involve multiple intended victims that are often randomly targeted.

As many of you already know, school shootings receive extensive media coverage, but are fourtnal infrequent. They often result in nationwide changes in school policies concerning discipline and security. Some experts have describe the fear of school shootings as a type of moral panic.

The first school shooting I'd like to tell you about is the well televised Columbine High. On April 20Th 1999 in the small town on Littleton Colorado two teen boys, Eric Harris and Dylan Kldbald met up at the student parking lot as they loaded their weapons. Then they made there way to a grassy hill, just outside the schools cafertia. They there shot their first victim, Rachel Scoot. Accorind to Richad Castaldo who was next to her (also shot but survived) they two boys taunted her about her faith before taking her life.

Then at 11:21 you could hear the shots ringing throughout the school. When the shooters entered the libary, they took with them the lives of their last ten victims. When all was said and done twelve students had been killed and so had one teacher and the two shooters commited suicide shortly after the libary attack. Twenty three students and faculty members were wonuded.

Columbine was the fourth deadlist school shooting in United States history. The first being the Bath School Disaster on May 18th 1927 were 45 lives were taken and many more wounded.

The Columbine massacre provoked many debates about gun control laws. Much more discussion also centred around on high school cliques, and bullying.

If you think nothing like that could ever happen here, think again. SuccessTech Acamady is one of Clevlands best publive schools with the highest graduation rate (94%). But that all changed abrtfully on October 10th 2007 when a 14-year-old boy Asa Coon opened fire in the school. He injured three students and two teachers, which were his personal tragets. But fourtanl no one was killed besides Asa who turned the gun on himself and fired it to his face.

Even a uiversty's took a huge blow this past year. Virginia Tech's mass murder Seung-Hui Cho took at total of 32 lives on April 16th 2007 before he shoot himself. That is this entire class dead.

This incident prompted immedite changes in the law that allowed an mentalla unsoounds man like Cho to purshaes fire arms. It also led to the passage of the first major gun control measure in mare then 13 years. This law strenghten the Natioanl Instant Criminal Background Check System signed my the presadient of the United Sates on January 5th 2008.
A Virginia Tech review panle ( which is a state-apponited body assigned to review the incient) critized the universty addmisnatration for failing to take action that might of reduced the number of casulites. They also pointed out gaps in mental health care as well misinterpretations of privacy laws that left Cho deteriorating condition untreated.
Then in Montreal, Dawson College was fell a victim to a gunman. On Septemeber 13th 2006 the gun man Kimveer Gill began shooting outside the de Maisonneuve Boulevard entrance to the school. He then moved toward the cafateria on the main floor of the college. One victim died at the secen, 19 more wounded with six of them needing surgery.
This was the FOURTH fatal shooting in Montreal alone. The first being Ecole Polytechnique massacre on December 6th in 1989 were 14 people died. Since the attack in 89, many feminsite groups and public officals have charatized the massacre as an anti-feminsite attack. Others also emphasieze about his abuse he suffered as a child, in my opinion and in many others this was simply an act of a madman, unrealted to larger socail issues. But still a lot of people blame it on the violence in media.
If so many people are complaing about the violence in media and blaming every act of viloence on it, why do you let you children watch the t.v, play video games on even go on the computer?
This incident also led to more strigent gun control laws in Canada and the changes in the tactial response of police to shootings. This change was credited for the minimizing deaths at Dawson College.
Then an Amish community school house was hit in Lancaster Pennsavliy. On Octorber 2nd 2006 Charles Carl Roberts arrived at the one room schoolhouse were the students were preaparing for a germen class. He walked in to the room and ordered all the males to leave the room, he then lines all the young girls up and tied their legs. He then shot them excution style. In the end five girls from age seven to 13 were dead and seven were wounded. Roberts also commited suicide.
This schoolhouse, West Nickel Mines School was torn down and a new schoolhouse with a very approate name, New Hope School was bulit at a new location.

Hey, this was alright. You didn't really make a point, you just kind of laid the grounds of what is happening and that it sucks.

The spelling and grammar was pretty rough. I'll just re-post it with the corrections in bold.

"Massacre at Columbine", "Terror at Tech".

Good morning teachers and fellow students. My name is Kelsey Howlett and today I am going to talk to you about the school shootings that have taken place in the United States in the past several years.

School shootings is a well used term in both American and Canadian media to describe gun violence at an education institution, epically the mass murder or spree killing at people of the institution. A school shooting can be perpetrated by one or more students, expelled, faculty members or an outsider. Unlike acts of revenge against certain people, school shootings involve multiple intended victims that are often randomly targeted.

As many of you already know, school shootings receive extensive media coverage, but are fortunately infrequent. They often result in nationwide changes in school policies concerning discipline and security. Some experts have describe the fear of school shootings as a type of moral panic.

The first school shooting I'd like to tell you about is the well televised Columbine High. On April 20th, 1999 in the small town on Littleton Colorado two teen boys, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold met up at the student parking lot as they loaded their weapons. Then they made there way to a grassy hill, just outside the schools cafeteria. They there shot their first victim, Rachel Scoot. According to Richard Castaldo who was next to her (also shot but survived) the two boys taunted her about her faith before taking her life.

Then at 11:21[this is strange, you don't mention a time in the first paragraph. Maybe you could say at what time the first shot was fired?] you could hear the shots ringing throughout the school. When the shooters entered the library, they took with them the lives of their last ten victims. When all was said and done, twelve students and one teacher had been killed. The two shooters committed suicide shortly after the library attack. Twenty three students and faculty members were wounded.

Columbine was the fourth deadliest school shooting in United States history. The first being the Bath School Disaster on May 18th, 1927 where 45 lives were taken and many more wounded.

The Columbine massacre provoked many debates about gun control laws. It also prompted more discussion centered around on high school cliques and bullying.

If you think nothing like that could ever happen here, think again. SuccessTech Acamady is one of Cleveland's best public schools with the highest graduation rate (94%). But that all changed awfully on October 10th, 2007 when 14-year-old Asa Coon opened fire in the school. He injured three students and two teachers, which were his personal targets. But fortunately no one was killed aside from Asa who turned the gun on himself and fired it to his face.

Even universities took a huge blow this past year. Virginia Tech's mass murder Seung-Hui Cho took at total of 32 lives on April 16th 2007 before he shoot himself. That is this entire class dead.

This incident prompted immediate changes in the law that allowed an mentally unsound man like Cho to purchase firearms. It also led to the passage of the first major gun control measure in mare then 13 years. This law strengthen the National Instant Criminal Background Check System signed by the President of the United Sates on January 5th 2008.

The Virginia Tech review panel , a state-appointed body assigned to review the incident, criticized the university administration for failing to take action that might of reduced the number of casualties. They also pointed out gaps in mental health care as well misinterpretations of privacy laws that left Cho deteriorating condition untreated.

Then in Montreal, Dawson College was fell a victim to a gunman. On September 13th, 2006 the gunman Kimveer Gill began shooting outside the de Maisonneuve Boulevard entrance to the school. He then moved toward the cafeteria on the main floor of the college. One victim died at the seven, 19 more wounded with six of them needing surgery.

This was the FOURTH fatal shooting in Montreal alone. The first being Ecole Polytechnique massacre on December 6th in 1989 where 14 people died. Since the attack in 89, many feminist groups and public officials have characterized the massacre as an anti-feminist attack. Others emphasize about his abuse he suffered as a child, in my opinion and in many others this was simply an act of a madman, unrelated to larger social issues. However, many people blame it on the violence in media. [I disagree with this last argument, it is a logical fallacy of appeal to the people. Quote an expert, but don't say what public opinion is]

If so many people are complaining about the violence in media and blaming every act of violence on it, why do they let their children watch TV, play video games on it, and even use the computer?

This incident also led to more stringent gun control laws in Canada and the changes in the tactical response of police to shootings. This change was credited for the minimizing deaths at Dawson College.

Then an Amish community school house was hit in Lancaster Pennsylvania. On October 2nd, 2006 Charles Carl Roberts arrived at the one room schoolhouse were the students were preparing for a German class. He walked in to the room and ordered all the males to leave the room, he then lined up all the young girls and tied their legs. He then shot them execution style. In the end five girls from age seven to thirteen were dead and seven were wounded. Roberts then committed suicide.

This schoolhouse, West Nickel Mines School was torn down and a new schoolhouse with a very appropriate name. The New Hope School was built at a new location.


Okay, this last bit of information is incorrect. The youngest girl was six.

All in all, it reads a lot like a speech would sound. In the future I beg you to please, please, please use spell check before you post.

It's well-organized and fairly well-researched. You do not make a point, however, and depending upon the type of speech you were supposed to write, that could be a good or a bad thing.

A lot of speech judges want a persuasive point to be made.

You start to make a point with the "The Media Encourages Violence" information, but you didn't cite any real sources. I would still disagree with your point, but applaud your style if you quoted a genuine authority, like a behavioral psychologist, and stressed the fact that parents still let their children play violent video games, watch violent movies, and listen to violent music.

Just remember to use spell check.

Keep up the good work.

Hey, Kelsi!

Ooer! A speech! I'm an uber-speech nerd, so I might be a little rough on you, but this topic is frankly amazin' raisin. I want you to do the best with it that you can. ^_~

First off--is this a persuasive or an informative speech?

Good morning teachers and fellow students. My name is Kelsey Howlett and today I am going to talk to you about the school shootings that have taken place in the United States in the past serval years.

Beginning with that 'good morning', I'm asleep. Why? It's what the dude on the school PA says when reading off daily announcements.

The intro is the good bit of your speech. Why? You usually do one in about a minute--the length of a television ad. Your audience is only paying attention to you within the first forty-five seconds or so, and will only continue to pay attention to you if you keep it interesting.

A good intro is made up of the following:

- a "hook"

- a rationale [why do we care about this topic?] and a definition

- a statement of points/thesis.

Here's an intro to a speech I gave yesterday:

Agribusiness. Agricultural business. It's a buzzword you're probably familiar with, being a Nebraska resident. But as Stephen Colbert so wisely noted, it's "just one letter away from angrybusiness". And recently in Washington, it's become just that, with farmers pulling out their pitchforks over a recent Senate bill that would cut farm subsidies--payments the government sends to farmers--to farms that generate more than $750,000 per year in income. With all of this hoo-hah, it's important to ask the question: what kind of effect will the senate farm bill have on American agribusiness? The answer is: it will have no effect. This is due to ethanol, economics, and extras.

If you'll look, it goes like this:

Agribusiness. HOOK: Agricultural business. It's a buzzword you're probably familiar with, being a Nebraska resident. But as Stephen Colbert so wisely noted, it's "just one letter away from angrybusiness". RATIONALE/DEFINITION: And recently in Washington, it's become just that, with farmers pulling out their pitchforks over a recent Senate bill that would cut farm subsidies--payments the government sends to farmers--to farms that generate more than $750,000 per year in income. With all of this hoo-hah, THESIS AND POINTS: it's important to ask the question: what kind of effect will the senate farm bill have on American agribusiness? The answer is: it will have no effect. This is due to ethanol, economics, and extras.

If I mentioned the words "farms" or "subsidies" or "senate" in the first line of my speech, I'd have a bunch of snoozers in the back row. ^_~

Keep your topic a mystery at first. See how I didn't mention the farm bill until I stated my points? This keeps people guessing, even if it's a boring topic. They don't know what it's about, so they have to guess.

With a more serious topic like this, you'll want to establish some ethos and pathos in your intro.

ETHOS: credibility.
PATHOS: audience emotional response.

Ethos is just a matter of standing up straight and making sure your audience knows that you know what you're talking about. Cite your sources; sound like you're an authority on the issue.

Pathos is more difficult. With this topic, you're going to want to play into the human side of things--what goes on at school shootings? Fear? Fear of the unexpected?

"It's just a normal day at school. You're sitting in your desks when..."

You get the idea. ^_~ Playing with your audience's emotions is what will get you standing ovations.

___

Just rememeber that your intro is the most important part of your speech. Fix it up, and there's really no way you can go wrong. ^_^ Feel free to PM me if you have any questions--I really do love rambling about speeches. Tell me how it goes?

Hey!! Your avdise from the both of you is really great!! Sorry about not running it through spell check, I'll remeber for next time!

First off it's not a perssauive or an informative, our English teacher told us to write about something that intrest us, and I chose this.

Well thanks for the nice comments!!!
Kelsi!

First off it's not a perssauive or an informative, our English teacher told us to write about something that intrest us, and I chose this.

...but when you do that there's no point to it... I mean, I'm interested in the topic, too, but quite frankly I was perplexed by how much it rambled. Also, you jumped around from topic to topic a lot without any kind of transition. I was waiting for you to get somewhere and actually tell me what you thought about the topic. I wanted to know if you feel the same as I do about it. Make it a little more personal. Otherwise it's simply, like Sam said, the announcer over the PA saying what's on the schedule.

Meh...I don't know if that helped at all. It's just what I saw in it that turned it off for me.

Okay I'm not trying to sound rude or un-apprichated but if you read my top message when i first posted to speech you will see that it said THE SPEECH IS NOT FINSIHED!!!!!!!!!! Please go back and read that.

I KNOW the speech is not finished! I'm just trying to give you some advice for when you edit it. T_T

Hey, I just like to answers some of the questions and clear a few things up.
1) At the moment there really isn't a point to the speech, our school's English program tells us to write about something that interests us, that's the point.
2) Our speech judge is out English teacher. ( He gives us our oral grade and then decides if we go to finales or not and our audience is our class)
3) The beginning of "Good Morning" had to be there. It's a requirement in our school.
4) And this last one is for Galdius, I would like to know how I jumped from topic to topic? I introduced a new event, so if you could just tell me and I could fix it.
Thanks for the reviews, I'll post the rest of the speech soon!!
Kelsi =)

Good morning does sound like a chairman's job. Alas, it ruins the opening. Keep the housekeeping brief and go into your hook.

The main problem with your speech is that there's an awful lot of great style, some interestingly told incidents, but no POINT. WHY have you decided to write your speech?

A speech is not meant to be a lecture, monologue or an essay, it should be a conversation with the audience. You need to choose a topic that you can speak on with credibility and PASSION - the Burning Passion Factor. Otherwise your audience will not be attentive. Keep them interested. Reward them for listening to you and your subject.

Of course this is not the whole story. Communication and delivery are just as important as content. A good idea presented badly sounds like a bad idea. I don't know what your voice is like, but just some general tips.

1. Make sure you know where to emphasise words for impact.
2. Understand the power of pause for effect.
3. Don't use A4 sheets - they're too constraining. Use notecards.
4. Learn the importance of inflection: bending your voice so it doesn't sound too monotone. How many ways can you think of to say hello?
5. Make sure your diction is clear. Repeat words you find difficult.
6. Use gesture in the right places - not too little, and not too much so as not to distract your audience (and your marker).
7. Be aware of your body language - don't deliver a speech on one leg or with your arms folded. Use a mirror!
8. Maintain good eye contact with the whole room, not just the judge. Involve everyone.
9. Time is of the essence. TIME your speech. Stick to given parameters (are there any?) or you can lose marks.

Hope this helps. If you need anything else, PM me.

Gahks

Well aside from what everyone else is telling you, I kind of liked it. When I went over it the first time, I was cranky from having to meticulously edit your spelling/grammar.

I've been in debate, and they always made us introduce ourselves starting with, "Good morning" so I guess that's why it didn't bother me.

It has excellent potential. And I think your English teacher might like it if you went above and beyond and snuck a point into your speech. It'd make you look like a brilliant over-achiever.

Keep up the good work,
Scotty.

Thanks, you did have some helpful tip, but most of it I already know. And with the whole point thing. THERE DOES NOT HAVE TO BE A POINT. You no what the point is, I HAVE TO WRITE A SPEECH FOR ENGLISH CLASS THAT IS WORTH 15% OF MY MARK!!!!!!!!!!!!! No one in my class is going to care what I am saying. I get good marks in English, I no the outline out teacher has given us, SO PLEASE ALL OF YOU STOP WITH THE WHOLE POINT THING. THERE DOSENT HAVE TO BE ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kelsi=)

Thanks scotty.knows. I am sorry about the spelling and grammar, I forgot to run through spell check. And thanks for agreeing with the "Good Morning", I will lose marks for not adding that.!!!!!
Thanks Again,
Kelsi =)