By Mikayla van Loon
Public speaking can be a task many people avoid but for three Grade 6 students from across Lilydale and Montrose, it came with relative ease.
As winners of the Rotary Club of Lilydale’s primary school speech contest, Montrose Primary School student Elisha and St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School students Ella and Galin were given the opportunity to perform their speeches once more at the club’s monthly meeting.
On Tuesday 10 October, their passion, confidence and capability shone through as each of them took to the mic.
Each choosing a topic of their liking, Elisha, Ella and Galin said it was something that resonated with them.
For Elisha, that was kindness.
“My topic was the importance of kindness. I just felt like kindness is a part of what I do and I felt like that it had a lot of connections with my personality,” he said.
Ella drew inspiration from the Anzacs for her speech, having had “great great grandparents that were in the war”.
“I wanted to capture a fake diary entry from our soldiers perspective and what it was like on the front lines of Gallipoli and I wanted to capture all of the gruesome stuff and how hard it was,” she said.
“The Anzacs had a very low chance of winning and I wanted to put it in perspective, so I was trying to tell people that it was actually really hard for them to win.”
Galin also spoke on a topic that meant a lot to her – the meaning of happiness.
“What happiness means to me is my family. They mean a lot to me, they make me happy and it’s always such a safe place to be,” she said.
“Everyone deserves to have happiness. Whether you’ve been through something, there’s always a way to find happiness. Sometimes it may be hard but you just have to find it. You have to look for it, and you have to be able to dig deep.”
Although having wanted to take part in the speech contest last year, Galin said this year it just all felt right to give it a go.
“I wanted to give it a shot because it was my last year at primary school, so I wanted to give it my all,” she said.
“When I heard that there was a topic about happiness that was the one that really made me strive to do it.”
Making speeches wasn’t ever something Elisha had tried either but he said he has grown more confident since taking part in the school production.
“I haven’t tried it before but recently when we started at school doing the speech, I went through lots of different stages until now but I’ve just started becoming really good at public speaking,” Elisha said.
“Especially early in the year with getting a lead role in the school production because that involved a lot of talking.”
As a house captain and having been part of the contest last year, Ella said she “likes presenting speeches to lots of different people” and it all helps her get better.
“When we were elected for the role, we had to do a speech and we have to present at assemblies every four weeks.
“So that’s pretty good because then that also helps me with my speaking and all that kind of stuff so when I get to [the speech contest], it gives me more confidence so I know how to do it properly.”
Presenting not just a speech but an impassioned point of view, Ella brought props and Elisha and Galin used hand gestures and changes in their voice to deliver powerful portrayals of happiness, kindness and the Anzacs.
“During speeches, it’s about my opinion, I’m the one who’s writing about what I think and it’s a great way to show your emotions and how you’re feeling when it comes to actually writing it,” Galin said.
