COAL CITY — Coal City sophomore Zackary Landers’ mission at the Illinois state speech team tournament two weeks ago was to stand up and give a six-minute speech on one word chosen for him.
Once he got that word, he only had two minutes to prepare that speech.
The word was, “seriously.”
“I knew right away what my attention-getter would be,” he said. “I’m a vegetarian 365 days of the year. When I tell people that, their response is almost always, ‘Seriously?’”
Zack used that piece of his life to launch his six-minute speech on how the word “seriously” is used in the language of today. For his impromptu speaking category, Zach took sixth place in state this year, competing as a sophomore against students older and with more experience and from much larger schools than Coal City.
He was the only student from a school of less than 1,500 students to place in any category at state this year.
Zack was with good company at state this year. Two other Coal City students also qualified for state and went with him. They were Kelsey Devine for humorous interpretation and Carlos Shoemaker for informative speaking.
“It was a fun season,” Zack said. “My goal at the beginning of the season was to medal at the state tournament. There was some pretty stiff competition. I was fortunate enough to go that far. I think I gave some solid speeches.”
“Zack had a lot of confidence this year,” Coal City High School speech team coach and social studies teacher David Sinkular said. “He does think on his feet, and he is able to think pretty quickly.”
Sinkular said it is unusual for a sophomore to do so well at the state level, but Zack is good at that category.
Coal City has a good record in the impromptu speaking speech team category. Two years ago, it was John Marsaglia who took honors in that category at state, and before him, it was Grant Mosey. Sinkular said coaches ask him Coal City’s secret, and he has to say he doesn’t exactly know.
Perhaps it’s the mentorship of the students in that category. John was able to watch Grant work impromptu, and Zack followed close behind John.
In the impromptu speaking category, students are given three choices at each tournament — a quote, a word and maybe a proverb. They choose one of those and are given two minutes to fashion a six-minute speech.
To train, Sinkular said students are taught about speech-writing skills and reminded of the same format they use when they write papers for English classes. It helps to have a good grasp of social studies, too, he added, to give historical relevance.
“It’s a lot of practice,” he said, “and you have to get used to thinking that way.”
Sinkular said two examples of words given students this year during the final rounds at state were the words, “cereal,” and, “really.”
Zack also went to state this year for the category of extemporaneous speaking. For that, students are given a current events topic on which they have 45 minutes to research and prepare a speech. The speech is six minutes. Students are allowed to bring hard copy information for preparation, but no electronic sources.
Zack brings a big box full of everything from current events magazines, a dictionary and thesaurus, a book of quotations, newspapers and his Mardi-gras beads from previous speech tournaments. The beads actually help hold his place in the reference materials, he said.
This year, some of his extemporaneous speaking assignments were, “Does Donald Trump have a viable chance to become president in 2012?,” “What is to blame for the Mexican drug wars?” and “What do Iran’s nuclear ambitions mean to the international community?”
For Zack, impromptu is actually more difficult for him than extemporaneous, even though it was what got him sixth place at state. It was just a coincidence of being on the golf team with Sinkular that even made Zack decide to participate in speech in the first place. Before, he had his heart set on being a wrestler, which would have made speech impossible, with their overlapping seasons.
“I wanted to be a wrestler,” Zack said. “At first I was really bullheaded about it, but after enough pressure ... it was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”
Speech team ended up to be a great fit for him, he said.
“One thing I like about it is being with other people who like doing the same thing as I do,” he said, “and meeting other people from different schools who share the same interests and goals and working toward those common goals.”
Coaches choose the categories their students perform for Coal City’s speech team, but Zack said his coaches chose the same ones he would have chosen for himself. He remembers the first time he heard about the categories.
“My first reaction was, ‘There’s really a thing that lets me do this?’” he said.