Post date: Jan 25, 2015 10:07:38 PM

Dear Church School parents and students,

Our parish-level St. John Chrysostom Oratorical Festival is coming up very soon.

The Oratorical Festival is very important for the spiritual growth of our children as it pushes them to research, think about, and write upon a subject of our Orthodox faith. All of them will be called upon to explain their faith to others down the road and they will also be contemplating their own faith constantly. Furthermore, offering the essay as a speech will enhance their ability to speak publicly and ease their apprehensions of doing so. This is a very important skill. Also, these speeches are a requirement for an Honor Award at the end of the Church School year.

Therefore, I and the Church School administration and teachers strongly encourage all children in the 6th -12th grades to participate in the Oratorical Festival by researching, writing, and offering as a speech an essay (6th graders are able to give a speech, but will not be included in the actual “scoring” of the festival).

This year, because so many students participate in the event and to help the students produce the best they are able, all speeches will be due on or before Sunday, March 1st, 2015.

That will allow me enough time to go over their speeches and offer advice and guidance to help improve them.

The Oratorical Festival will take place on Sunday, March 15th. All students will need to be in the social hall by 9 AM to make sure we can begin on time and get through all the speeches before the fellowship hour.

I will make sure that all speeches will be returned to the students so that they will have at least a week or more of prep time to sharpen their presentation skills before the March 15th festival.

Last year we had 23 speakers. Videos of their speeches are available on-line as examples of our students excellence. Please take a look. You will be very proud!

https://www.youtube.com/user/churchschoolaa

Parents, please make sure that this email message is communicated to your student(s), too. (No Church School email goes directly to students.)

Once again, we are all looking forward to this year's Oratorical Festival!

God bless,

Fr. Nick