Written by Elena (edited by Swarajit)
Introduction
This was the first meeting of 2012, with a new venue for the club and a lot of new faces!
The meeting was opened by Club President Glen who welcomed new guests, returning guests, regular members and the club committee. He invited the audience to use the Toastmasters educational programme as a guide to better public speaking and leadership.
The Toastmaster of the first meeting in 2012 was past president, and very experienced member, Nazia. She announced the theme –The goals for 2012– and introduced every speaker to the stage with what they had chosen as their own goal summarised in one word, which was quite a challenge! Nazia was assisted by the Timekeeper Richard, who did this role for the first time.
Prepared speeches
This evening we were very happy to have two Ice Breaker speeches from our new members Maureen and Paula, who made their first step into their Toastmasters careers through the Competent Communication (CC) programme.
This part of the meeting was opened by Paula with her Ice Breaker speech entitled “Going for Gold”. She gave us a very descriptive overview of her life from school age up to the present and also her plans for the near future, including setting up her own website, in the 2012 Olympic year – going for gold.
The second speaker was Maureen, who presented her own Ice Breaker speech entitled “How Risk-Averse Mo Became a Bloomsbury Speaker”. Maureen told us her life story over the last few years explaining how she learnt about Toastmasters through an acquaintance and finally pushed herself to take the plunge and join Bloomsbury Speakers to enjoy the opportunities on offer.
The next speaker was Jo with her speech No.2 from the CC manual entitled “Unexpected Sights in Buenos Aires”. The main objective of this speech project is to organise your speech so that it has an opening, body and conclusion with appropriate transitions between each. Jo told us about several unusual but very popular sights which she had seen during her travels to Argentina including a cemetery, a branch of the famous department store Harrods, the Mothers of Plaza De Mayo and tango dancing.
The fourth speaker was Neil with his No. 4 speech, “Finding a Room in London“. The main purpose of this project is focused on “how to say it” using rhetorical devices. Neil vividly described several highly amusing situations that arose during his search for a room in London, and the characters he met along the way. Happily, it ended with him eventually finding a beautiful place to live earlier in the day.
The last speaker this evening was Swarajit with his No. 5 speech entitled “Evolution of an industry”. The main purpose of this speech project is to make use of body language and physical gestures to convey your message. Swarajit explained how the UK music industry had changed over the last few decades and why he thought this was a bad thing. He argued, using humour, that the rise in popularity of live concerts was unjustified due to the considerable discomfort of attending such events.
Speech evaluations
After the break we had the evaluations part of the meeting, where speakers can get constructive feedback on their speeches and some useful ideas for further improvements.
The first evaluator, Nazia, evaluated Paula’s Ice Breaker speech. She commended a very well structured speech containing three short stories about moving to South Asia, becoming a psychologist and how Paula set up her own business. Nazia also noted Paula’s confident and good strong voice. The only recommendation was to make a more powerful conclusion.
The second evaluator was Joe, who evaluated Maureen’s Ice Breaker speech. He commented that Maureen had excellent vocal variety, used humour that was very engaging with audience, and the structure was good which made it easy to follow the story. Joe made only one minor recommendation: to move on the stage slightly more.
The next evaluator, Adam, evaluated Jo’s No. 2 speech. He commended a very clear message, the great opening and structure of the speech, and an engaging voice and humour. Adam would have liked to have seen a bit more body language from Jo.
The fourth evaluator this evening was Joyanta, who evaluated Neil’s No. 4 speech. He commented that Neil is a very good storyteller, he had fairly successfully joined three small stories into one in the speech and concluded with a memorable quote – “Good luck!” Joyanta encouraged Neil to speak on something like a technical subject in his next speech in order to stretch himself further.
The last evaluator, Elena, evaluated Swarajit’s entertaining No. 5 speech. She recapped the aim of the project and commented that Swarajit had used gestures, facial expressions, eye contact to express his message when delivering his speech, and met that goal. Elena recommended that Swarajit should try to rely less on notes.
Table Topics
During the meeting everyone has a chance to speak and the Table Topics section is one part which ensures this. Participating in Table Topics is great practice for both new and experienced members as well as brave guest volunteers.
The Topics Master of the evening was Hari. He transformed the audience into a group of potential investors and the topics speakers into people looking for investment to realise their goals. The investment seekers were:
- One of the Wright brothers who have a goal to build an aeroplane.
- Computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee who needs to convince us to have a world wide web.
- Creator of a web site where people can reveal all of sorts of details about themselves – a social network.
- Percy Spencer, looking for investors for an experimental way of cooking food using microwaves.
- An unemployed IBM scientist whose goal is to start up new business to produce computer.
Five guests took part in the Table Topics including a visiting member from Holborn Speakers.
The Table Topics evaluator this evening was Glen, who evaluated each participant. Common recommendations were: do not be repetitive during the speech, grab the stage and try to use the whole allotted time.
General Evaluator Rosalind, also visiting from Holborn Speakers, evaluated all the meeting participants who were yet to be evaluated and encouraged us to not be afraid to give a few more recommendations because they are gifts for the speakers.
Awards
Closing the meeting, Glen gave out the awards based on the votes cast during the evening and one President’s discretional award.
The Best Evaluator award went to Adam for his evaluation of Jo’s speech, the Best Table Topics speaker award went to guest David for his well-structured topic and the highly coveted Best Speaker award went to Neil for his excellent speech. The President’s discretional award went to a guest Oli for his very impressive Table Topic.
Two certificates for successfully completing their Ice Breaker speeches– an important landmark for any Toastmaster– went to Paula and Maureen.
Next meeting
Our next meeting is on Monday 23rd January at The Real Man Pizza Company.
