Â鶹ÊÓƵ

PREECEVILLE - Hazel Dell youth, Amber Spray won first place in the junior 4-H provincial speaking event held in Middle Lake on April 9. Spray also won first place in the same category at the club, district and regional competitions. She competed against 32 other top members from across Saskatchewan.

She is an active member of the Kelvington 4-H Beef Club and is very passionate about the farming and cattle industry. Her speech entitled, The Rush, was written addressing the adrenaline rush that she gets playing sports or working with her 4-H projects. “I used the same speech throughout the different levels of speaking that included the first time it was recited at the club level speaking competition,” she said. She advanced from there to districts where she won first place and she also received first place at regional competitions. Spray said each time she made some minor improvements to the speech.

This is the second time she has attended provincials, the only other tine being when she was a cloverbud where she won first place.

“Public speaking has helped me to become a more confident person and gave me the experience to talk to others in school and in the public. I loved the entire experience from creating the speech to the delivering of it and making new friends. The judges were looking for many things during my speech from my posture, delivery, punctuation, expressions and tones pf my voice. It was a little overwhelming but it was so fun,” she shared.

Amber now turns her attention to her six 4-H projects that she is working with for this season.

The Three Lakes 4-H Beef Club hosted the provincial competition and it was the first time since 2020 and COVID-19 that participants could attend public speaking in-person. Last year submissions were adapted to an online platform. “It was great to get back to in-person events. Leaders, members, family and guests were excited to see each other with chatting and catching up what we missed in-person for the last three years,” said Krystal Spray, Amber’s mom.