Grade-level declamations at Tampa Prep wrapped up last week, determining which students will represent each grade in the next round. The annual assignment, a long-standing tradition at the school, is designed to help students develop public speaking skills.
“The aim of the declamation assignment is, first and foremost, to give students experience in public speaking,” English teacher John Bamford said. “This is something that causes people anxiety. It is very nerve-racking, but it is a very important skill.”
Bamford noted that strong declamations often center on themes that resonate with both students and adults in the audience.
“The meaningfulness and relevance of the theme to everyone is important,” he said. “Good writing, good sentences, good word choices. And then there is the performance…how well memorized it is, how the speaker uses their voice, and whether they incorporate body language and hand gestures.”
Bamford highlighted several memorable speeches from this year, including one from a ballerina who became a mentor to younger dancers, a basketball player discussing how to handle failure, and a student recounting a near-death experience in Israel and its impact on their outlook on life.
Junior Grant Gaugush, who has represented his grade for declamation three of the past four years, takes a lot of time to prepare for declamations and the memorization process.
“I like to break my speeches up into more manageable chunks, and then each night I work to memorize a single chunk. Then I run the whole thing through, start to finish, and time myself, making tweaks along the way in case I have to cut out or add anything,” Gaugush said.
Gaugush also recalled a standout declamation from a previous year that left a lasting impression for him.
“One declamation that’s always stuck with me was Kai Nelson’s speech on his job at a smoothie shop,” Donaldson said. “He has a very comfortable manner on stage, but what I liked most about it was that it started out funny and then transitioned into a message that everyone could use and apply to their daily lives.”
Gaugush emphasized that passion is a key factor in a successful declamation.
“I think that the best declamations are the ones that the speaker is passionate about,” he said. “If the speaker doesn’t care, the audience won’t either. Finding a topic that genuinely interests you usually leads to the best kind of declamation.”
