Your Weekly Dose of Awesome . . .

August 30, 2021 - Our first full weekly update for the 2021-2022 school year

FULL TEXT LINKS:

Annie Hall – Screenplay by Woody Allen and Marshall Brickman
Random House Sept 1982 978-0394712291
Humorous Duo for a M/F Pair
2006, 2008, 2009, and 2017 National Qualifier; NIETOC; CA State Qualifier
Relationships
PG-13 - High School
[Found in Four Films] Comedian Alvy Singer examines the rise and fall of his relationship with
struggling nightclub singer Annie Hall. Speaking directly to the audience in front of a bare
background, Singer reflects briefly on his childhood and his early adult years before settling in
to tell the story of how he and Annie met, fell in love, and struggled with the obstacles of
modern romance, mixing surreal fantasy sequences with small moments of emotional drama.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X and Alex Haley

African American Images Dec 1989 978-0345350688
Dramatic Interp for a Male
2003 and 2016 National Qualifier; NIETOC
Memoir
PG-13 - High School
Malcolm X's searing memoir belongs on the small shelf of great autobiographies. The reasons
are many: the blistering honesty with which he recounts his transformation from a bitter, self-
destructive petty criminal into an articulate political activist, the continued relevance of his
militant analysis of white racism, and his emphasis on self-respect and self-help for African
Americans. And there's the vividness with which he depicts black popular culture--try as he
might to criticize those lindy hops at Boston's Roseland dance hall from the perspective of his
Muslim faith, he can't help but make them sound pretty wonderful. These are but a few
examples. The Autobiography of Malcolm X limns an archetypal journey from ignorance and
despair to knowledge and spiritual awakening. When Malcolm tells coauthor Alex Haley,
"People don't realize how a man's whole life can be changed by one book," he voices the
central belief underpinning every attempt to set down a personal story as an example for
others. Although many believe his ethic was directly opposed to Martin Luther King Jr.'s during
the civil rights struggle of the '60s, the two were not so different. Malcolm may have displayed
a most un-Christian distaste for loving his enemies, but he understood with King that love of
God and love of self are the necessary first steps on the road to freedom.

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The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis
Groundwood Books May 2015 978-1554987658
Serious Prose for a Female
2020 National Qualifier – MS
Middle East
PG - Middle School Appropriate
An award-winning novel about loyalty, survival, families, and friendship under extraordinary
circumstances during the Taliban’s rule in Afghanistan. Eleven-year-old Parvana lives with her
family in one room of a bombed-out apartment building in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital city.
Parvana’s father — a history teacher until his school was bombed and his health destroyed —
works from a blanket on the ground in the marketplace, reading letters for people who cannot
read or write. One day, he is arrested for the crime of having a foreign education, and the
family is left without someone who can earn money or even shop for food. As conditions for
the family grow desperate, only one solution emerges. Forbidden to earn money as a girl,
Parvana must transform herself into a boy, and become the breadwinner.

The Ant Eater by Roald Dahl

Puffin Aug 1986 978-0140504354
Humorous Poetry for Any Gender
2002 National Qualifier (Selections from Dirty Beasts)
2020 National Qualifier – MS (The Ant Eater)
Children's Literature
PG - Middle School Appropriate
[Found in Dirty Beasts, Page 11] In the U.S.A., near San Francisco, lived a very stupid and
spoiled boy named Roy. His parents bought him everything he ever wanted. One day he
decided that he wanted a peculiar pet that no one else owned: he wanted a giant anteater.
When the anteater arrived, it was half-dead with starvation from the long journey. He asked
Roy for food, but the cruel boy told the anteater to go find ants. Unfortunately, there weren’t
any in the garden. That very day, Roy’s aunt Dorothy came to visit. She was a foul old hag of 83.
Roy introduced her to the anteater saying, “Anteater! Don’t lie there yawning! / This is my ant!
Come say good-morning!” (Here the narrator interjects to point out that Americans say “aunt”
and “can’t” incorrectly.) The anteater was excited to see such a huge “ant” and quickly gobbled
her up. Roy fled to the potting shed and hid. “But ant-eater came sneaking in / (Already it was
much less thin). And said to Roy, ‘You little squirt, / I think I’ll have you for dessert.'” The poem
is a poignant one that details the moral corruption and utter ignorance that is the result of an
excessive lifestyle.

Foster Care: We Can and Should Do More by Sarah A Font and Elizabeth T Gershoff
(A Good Place to Start Research)
Thanks for Coach Sarah Garrison of Lexington High School, TX for the suggested topic.
Social Policy Report Nov 30, 2020 On-Line Article
Serious Oratory for Any Gender

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Foster Care
PG-13 - High School
Foster care provides round-the-clock substitute care for nearly 700,000 U.S. children who are
temporarily or permanently separated from their family of origin each year. Each state
manages its own foster care system according to federal regulations. Despite numerous large-
scale federal policy reforms over the past several decades, substantial concerns remain about
the experiences and outcomes of children in the foster care system. The most recent effort to
reform foster care, the Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018, attempts to both reduce
the use of foster care and increase the quality of care. In this report, we review how policy has
shaped the experiences and outcomes of children in foster care, where policy has succeeded,
and where it falls short of achieving its goals. We then identify opportunities for federal and
state policy to better support the safety, health, and well-being of children in foster care.

VAULT OF CUTTINGS:

Based on coach feedback, we have created more specific search parameters for the CATEGORY field in
the 4N6 Fanatics database http://4n6fanatics.com/ NOTE: These specific search parameters apply to
VAULT selections only
• Duo Interp – 2-Character or Multi-Character
• Solo Interp – Monologue or Multi-Character
• Prose – Narrator Only or Multi-Character
Select “Online Availability“ – STORED IN THE VAULT OF CUTTINGS and your desired Category to filter
results. For broader searches outside the VAULT OF CUTTINGS, please continue to use the broad
category of Duo Interp, Solo Interp and Prose

Extemp Topics for August 2021

162 Extemp Topics covering current events occurring during the months of August 2021
85 Domestic Topics and 77 Foreign Topics have been uploaded to the VAULT OF CUTTINGS and
added to the EXTEMP TOPIC GENERATOR

I Bring You Flowers by William Lang

Samuel French, Inc. April 2017 978-0874408331
Serious Duo for a M/F Pair (2-Character)
2003, 2005, 2006, 2011 and 2020 National Qualifier; KS State Qualifier; OH State Qualifier
Mental Illness
PG-13 - High School
CUTTING STORED IN THE VAULT: The young man seated on the bench reads his paper and chats
with his wife about domestic matters and their daughter. As the conversation becomes more
strained and personal, we realize the bench is in the courtyard of an institution where the

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young wife is an inmate, and the husband a visitor. He pleads with her to abandon the dream
that their baby girl is still alive and playing in the yard, but she stubbornly clings to her own
view of reality. Warm, compassionate and powerful.

Spoonface Steinberg by Lee Hall

Methuen Publishing, Ltd Nov 2000 978-0413748706
Dramatic Interp (Monologue) for a Female
2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2019 National Qualifier; 2016
National Qualifier- MS; NIETOC; CA, CO, IL, and KS State Qualifier
Autism
PG - Middle School Appropriate
CUTTING STORED IN THE VAULT: A moving story about life, death and faith, told from the view
of a young autistic girl. Spoonface Steinberg is seven years old, autistic, very bright and
terminally ill with cancer. She confronts her impending death with stoical grace and with a
belief in the glory of God. She speaks of loss, separation, sparks and death with a sense of
innocent, baffled wonderment.

That Which We Take for Granted – A Collection by Joy Harjo, Robert Wrigley, Elise Paschen
and Charlotte Mew
Various Various Various
Serious Poetry for Any Gender
2020 National Qualifier – MS
Environment
PG- Middle School Appropriate
CUTTING STORED IN THE VAULT: Contains Once the world was perfect by Joy Harjo; Little Deaths by
Robert Wrigley; The Tree Agreement by Elise Paschen; and The Trees are Down by Charlotte Mew.
Water, animal life, trees . . . Our native American ancestors recognized the value of nature. When did
we, as a society, start taking our natural world for granted? The statistics are staggering. The US
Environmental Protection Agency reports that Americans dump 16 tons of sewage into our waterways
every minute. And according to the World Resources Institute, 100 animal species die each day due to
deforestation. Nature is all around us, yet we have become so intent on fighting each other that we
seem to have forgotten the very planet that sustains us. Albert Einstein once said: “There are only two
ways to live your life. One is as if nothing is a miracle. The other is as if everything is a miracle.”

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