by Patrick McDonald | Mar 13, 2021 | Communication/Rhetoric, Speaking
Earlier this season, I received a ballot from a judge who was thoroughly and absolutely confused. At the base of her puzzlement was the solitary word: inherency. My partner and I had argued that the affirmative plan had essentially already been passed, and thus...
by Patrick McDonald | Feb 25, 2021 | Speaking, Strategy
Dear friends, not unfriendly acquaintances, others, I have a confession to make. Several days ago, I unearthed the script of the first full-length speech I ever wrote. On a hunch, I opened up the search function via Ctrl + F and punched in a solitary question mark....
by Patrick McDonald | Feb 11, 2021 | Speaking, Strategy
He’s asleep. He’s literally asleep. When that thought pierced into my mind, my initial reaction was one of astonishment. I was roughly halfway through my Persuasive speech, and five feet in front of me was the head judge, his head peacefully at rest on his chair,...
by Patrick McDonald | Jan 28, 2021 | Strategy
In my novice year of debate, I had a time distribution problem. Perhaps this was because I enjoyed hearing myself ramble on about irrelevant points or demolishing the applicability of my opponent’s introduction. More likely, it was because my brain had yet to come to...
by Patrick McDonald | Dec 31, 2020 | Speaking
“At the end of the day… Moving down the flow… The fact of the matter is…” What do all of these fragments have in common? For one, they operate as “crutch words,” phrases that serve no purpose apart from buying you time to think of what you are going to say...
