Lisbon Speech is preparing for large group speech season this year, with conference speech meet coming up at Edgewood-Colesburg Jan. 13.
The team has 43 kids performing in nine different categories this year.
“Mrs. Reade and I are really happy with the commitment and attendance we’ve had for speech this year,” said Ellen Johanns, co-coach of the speech program. “We have quite a few kids who decided to try a new event, and roughly 20 ninth through twelfth graders who are brand new to speech this year.”
Johanns said that she is extremely excited for the musical theater piece, featuring the music from “Shrek: The Musical.”
“We have seven kids in that production, only two who have previously competed in musical theater before, so it’s been fun watching them learn that category, and I’ve been really impressed with how quickly they’ve picked things up,” Johanns said.
Mime and radio broadcasting events are also filled with kids who have never performed in those categories before.
“As a team, we are mostly performing comedic pieces this year, so that means a lot of laughter in rehearsals as we figure out the timing of lines and the physicality of those pieces,” Johanns said. “We also have a horror film that will be unique to what we’ve sent to Contest in the past.”
District speech meet for Lisbon will be at Iowa City Liberty Saturday, Jan. 20, and state at Pleasant Valley Saturday, Feb. 3.
All-State Speech will be Feb. 17 at Iowa State University.
“The hope is always that our performers see value in creating art for public viewing and come back again the next year, regardless of rating,” Johanns said. “I hope they learn to use feedback, and I hope they get to spend some time with kids they might not normally see or interact with in their normal day-to-day lives. The cool thing about Lisbon is that our ‘speech kids’ are the everything else kids too–athletes, musicians, etc. It’s fun to see so many kids come together for a common goal.”
The Three Bears tell their own “story of their life” as part of the “Shrek” musical theater piece for Lisbon Schools.