Just a Minute

This is a game/exercise that I built to help students develop their confidence in speaking publicly. It uses the model of 'Just a Minute'.

Objective

By progressively increasing group-size, the game draws students into speaking situations that they might normally avoid, or be anxious about.

How to Play

The game needs as an absolute minimum 5 players. However, with anything more than 10 players, you can start to add in rounds (see below).

Players need to know how 'Just a Minute' works as a game. In essence, four panellists are challenged to speak for one minute on a given subject (which they are not able to prepare for in advance) without "repetition, hesitation, or deviation". Fuller instructions on what this means are available on Wikipedia. The BBC page has clips, should players want to listen beforehand.

Split players into groups of 5: four panellists and a chair/time-keeper (these latter roles can be split, if you have plenty of players). Parallel groups can run at the same time.

They are given a round of topics (see below for some suggestions), and the chair then runs the round, with a different panellist starting each topic. Keeping score is optional.

At the end of the first round, ask players to swap around roles, then get them to play a second round of topics. This means everyone speaks at some point.

After this will depend on how many players you have. Assuming you have at least 10, then you start to double the size of groups: e.g. two groups of 5 become one of 10. As before, get volunteers to play a third round, then new players to play a fourth.

This is endlessly scalable, although beyond a third round becomes time-consuming and benefits are reduced.

Each round typically takes 15 minutes to run.

After all the rounds you wish to run have been done, then debrief on the feedback topics below.

Sample Topics:

Round 1:

  1. If I ruled the world
  2. Swing
  3. You can’t leave politics to politicians
  4. Why I’m right

Round 2:

  1. The politics of breakfast
  2. Whip
  3. When the revolution comes…
  4. Charisma

Round 3:

  1. My favourite politician
  2. Greece
  3. The most useful political concept I’ve ever heard of
  4. My political career

Round 4:

  1. Jaw-Jaw
  2. My research agenda
  3. Drone
  4. The Mother of all Parliaments

Round 5:

  1. Lobby
  2. Strategy
  3. Trust
  4. Plenary

Feedback Points

Since the session is about building confidence, this would be a good discussion, which could be accessed through talking about players' strategies, observations of others, the effect of the rules, etc.

Variations

  • Given the likely variability of numbers, session leaders might also want to play, giving others the ability to choose topics.
  • One might also envisage holding such a session on a regular basis, to further build confidence and as a community-building exercise.