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by Logan Scisco
Several weeks ago in a pre-season piece and in another strategy piece on tips for success, I stressed that reading is an important element in becoming a better extemporaneous speaker. The more that you know about the world, the more confident you will be about speaking about various topics ranging from Medicare to Syria to Mali. However, while reading is an important skill that extempers need to acquire, reading effectively is really what an aspiring extempers need to do so this strategy piece will provide some tips on how to do this.
Basic Points About Reading
In extemporaneous speaking you only get about thirty to prepare your speech. Granted, your prep time might be longer if a room that you are competing in gets backed up, but you should never count on this happening. To effectively use your prep time reading before the tournament is vital. The more you know about domestic and international events, the faster you can create a speech outline and pull out (or “pull up” these days since extempers are moving to digital filing) articles that will assist you in supplementing that outline. Reading also helps you know what is in your files before a tournament, which can greatly assist you when drawing your question for a particular round. If you know that your files only have three articles about Canada, then you know not to take any questions about Canada. You do not want to end up as the extempers that draws a question, gets back to their files, and suddenly realizes that they have nothing to cite in their speech.
Some other things to keep in mind about reading is that you are not going to remember everything that you read. Different people learn in different ways. For example, I am more of an “audio” learner, so if I hear a lecture or a conversation about a topic then I am more likely to retain it. However, there are extempers that have an excellent visual learning style that can remember long block quotes and recite them from memory. If that is you then great! If not, you may want to consider watching C-SPAN videos and other academic lectures on topics to supplement your reading, since your learning style is best suited through another medium. Luckily many news sites now have video clips to accompany their articles, so “audio intelligent” extempers can watch those.
You also need to keep in mind that you cannot read everything. There are way too many sources out there these days, domestic and international, so what you want to focus on are areas that you know you are weak. As I stated several weeks ago in a prior strategy piece, you want to take note of what areas you struggle with and read about those. It is always tempting to read about your favorite content area, whether it be the Middle East or domestic politics, but only doing that will make you one dimensional and vulnerable at tournaments when you get topics that are not in those areas. Therefore, if you struggle with African topics then it is advisable that you take time to read about major issues in the region and take a visit to AllAfrica, which you need to remember is a database and not a news source!
What Should I Read
When you are pressed for time, there are a couple of shortcuts to getting a broad overview of what is taking place in the world. This strategy is not going to give you the same depth as reading an entire article or briefing, but it will enable you to get an idea of what is happening in the world very quickly. One way to do this is to visit sites like Real Clear Politics, Real Clear World, Real Clear Markets, or the Drudge Report (which is right-wing). All of these sites provide a listing of news headlines and links to various articles and can provide you with insight of what is going on in the world on a particular day. You want to be careful when looking at the Drudge Report because although it can provide useful links, sometimes Matt Drudge, who runs the site, tends to exaggerate a story’s significance with his headlines. However, some of the ridiculous content you find on the Drudge Report can eventually be used as AGD material. The Economist also has a global politics and weekly business summary at the front of its magazine, which can also be accessed at its website if you are a subscriber, and this provides you with a few sentences about the major issues taking place in the world. Many of those issues are then discussed in greater detail in the magazine. If you are at a tournament and your coach gets you the day’s copy of the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, it’s always a good idea to quickly go through and scan the headlines before you settle on reading any articles. This will help you know if anything changed over the last 24 hours in the world which might alter your analysis of any pressing issues.
When you are reading a newspaper under time constraints it is good to read the first two paragraphs of the story, which will help you get a general idea of what is going on in regards to the issue the story is covering. Newspaper columnists use an “inverted pyramid” model when they write, which means that all of the important content is usually in the first several paragraphs and minor details are flushed out later in the story. This will provide you with a little more depth to the stories as you read than the tips recommended above, but if you have time it’s good to read the entire article.
Also, if you can only read a few articles in a newspaper it is always important to read the top story, which is the story that receives the most coverage in the paper, and then read the opinion-editorials at the back of the paper. Many extempers fail to read opinion-editorials (op-eds) and that is really unfortunate because op-eds are like small extemp speeches. The author will take an issue, explain their stance, and provide reasons that their view is correct. You can recognize the political bias of a newspaper by looking at its op-ed page. The Wall Street Journal is conservative, so you will find many conservative op-eds there, whereas The New York Times is liberal, so you will find liberal op-eds there. Sometimes there will be some crossover of political viewpoints, but it is rare. Therefore, cutting and reading op-eds is an excellent way to think about pressing domestic and international issues before a tournament and learn the liberal/conservative arguments around those issues.
Read Actively!
The biggest mistake that extempers make while reading is that they read a great deal of material, but they do not engage the text. If you do not engage the text by asking questions about it or thinking about how it can be of us to you later, then your level of comprehension will not be very high. One of the things that I recommend extempers do is to think about future questions that you might receive over the topic you are reading about and how the article you are reading can help you answer that question. For example, if you are reading an op-ed that argues that the Chinese economy is overheating, then it would be wise to think “hey, this article can help me if I get a question like ‘Is China’s economy overheating?”
Also, it is important to engage the text and try to commit a few facts to memory while reading the article. For example, if the article that you are reading provides some historical information or parallels then it might be useful to remember that. An example would be if you were reading an article about the Falkland Island dispute between Great Britain and Argentina and the article provided some details about the 1982 war that those countries waged over the Falkland Islands. Knowing that there was a previous war over the territory and how it turned out would be great background information to incorporate into a speech. The same logic applies to names of famous leaders that you may not be familiar with, important statistics (these are usually things like interest rates, growth rates, unemployment rates, etc.), and vocabulary. For example, if you do not know the different between “hard power” and “soft power” in international diplomacy then it would be good to learn that if the article you are reading explains it.
You also want to pay attention to parts of articles that provide a list of reasons why an event is taking place. The Economist and Christian Science Monitor are excellent sources for providing this type of analysis, which is vital when answering “Why” questions. The same holds true for articles that provide you a list of solutions for a particular problem in the world. One of the reason that I link to policy briefs and think tank reports in premium topic briefs and R&D sections is that these provide excellent analysis and give you solutions to global problems, which can help you answer “How” or “What steps…” questions. The International Crisis Group is one of the best sources that does this and you can apply their solutions to lots of extemporaneous speaking questions on the topics they cover. Their briefings are long, but you can also print off the summary, which highlights the important parts of the report, and file that away for the same effect. As you read this listing of reasons an event is happening or possible solutions, it is good to think about what type of question the article would help you answer and try to commit it to memory by quizzing yourself over the plan of action they recommend. If you know a lot about a certain area that the article or briefing is covering it is also a good idea to engage the text and assess the feasibility of a certain plan. Do you think the plan recommended by the writer or think tank will work? Why or why not? These are good questions to ask yourself and remain an active reader of the text.
One small drill that I did after reading an article or after reading several at a time was to quiz myself over what I just read. What was the major point of an article? What questions might you get that the article can help you with? Were there any important statistics in the article worth committing to long-term memory? If so, what were they? Did the article provide any solutions to a global or domestic problem? If so, what were they? By quizzing yourself over what you read you will increase your reading comprehension by engaging the text rather than passively shuffling through it.
Highlighting Tips
In the last section of this strategy piece I wanted to discuss highlighting. Whether you use paper or electronic files, you can still highlight since Microsoft Word has a highlighting function. The best part of using electronic files is that if you highlight then you can save money on highlighters. Remember that if you do highlight that NFL guidelines only let you highlight in one color, so make sure you do not violate that rule.
The purpose of highlighting is to direct your eyes to important information within an article. This purpose is defeated, though, if you go about highlighting the entire article. Therefore, what you want to do is keep your highlighting to a minimum. You want to avoid highlighting “common sense” items or things that you already know about an article. For example, it is not important to highlight Vladimir Putin’s name if you already know that he is the president of Russia. A good way to highlight is to highlight important statistics, names of organizations you are not familiar with, historical analogies, and then causes and solutions for problems. Sometimes, you do not even need to highlight this much. For example, if an article has an entire section devoted to solutions, then you can just highlight the word “solutions” and that should let you know to look there and that underneath that term are the solutions to the issue discussed in the article. Since many articles are written in an inverted pyramid style, you will likely have more highlighting at the beginning of an article than at the end, but your goal should be to establish a system that works for you. However, keeping highlighting to a minimum will help you identify the most important pieces of an article.