The Structure to Your Speech Opening Speeches

The Structure to Your Speech

Opening Speeches First, you should greet the audience and participators: 1) “Honorable chairs, ……. , adjudicating panel, ladies and gentlemen!” 2) “I’m very happy/honored to participate in today’s heated discussion on the issue of …. ”

Attention getter 1) Joke 2) Funny comment

Structural outline of your speech 1) 2) 3) “Let me start by outlining my speech. Firstly, I’m going to speak about the arguments of the opposition and show their deficiencies. Then I’ll restate and develop our points and finally I’ll demonstrate why the government wins on all the levels of today’s debate. ” “In my speech I’ll focus on three major levels: social, moral and economic. And I’m going to show that the case of the governments can stand on neither of them. ” “I’ll start by showing that the government’s case misunderstands the problem. ”

Rebuttal 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7) Pick the important points Do not criticize the individual speakers, criticize what they say “my opponent is right in…. . but” Attacking Relevance Attacking Assumption Attacking Logic Leap Do Attack New Arguments First

Content of your speech Arguments are the most basic building of debate. An argument is more than an assertion. An assertion says that smth is so, but an argument attempts to prove WHY the thing is so. There are 3 basic parts to any argument, easily remembered as A-R-E: 1) Assertion (a claim about the world) 2) Reasoning (why the claim is true) 3) Evidence (proofs, in the form of data or examples) Give the definition of terms!

Summary “In our case we have presented you the problem which has to be solved. Then we gave you our great plan that very efficiently deals with the problem, greatly reducing it’s harms. Our political arguments prove that …. . , our moral position is …. . , and economically we …. . ”

Final words 1) The government is going nowhere. Don’t let them take YOU with them. I beg you to oppose. 2) I’m proud on the side of the government to offer you this wonderful case. The only right answer to it should be YES. Vote for us. 3) Populism is not popular in this house. Don’t let yourselves be fooled by mountains of gold and lakes of beer. Oppose the plan with us.

Fundamental tips q. Use your body language q. Make eye contact (but do not look and convince the opponents) q. Vocal variety q. Word economy q. Filler words ( “remember”, “in fact”)