"PIRATES- NOT IN A MONTH OF SUNDAYS!"

These were the intriguing titles of the prepared speeches at today's Pania Toastmasters meeting, Toastmaster of the day was Cheryl  and she ran an excellent meeting with the two prepared speeches and Table Topics session.


The first speaker was Jeanette with her subject "Not in a Month of Sundays" as she spoke of her experiences taking her 3 year old to swimming lessons.The objective of the assignment was to maximise body language and needless to say Jeanette excelled here, with expressive use of hands, arms and body to illustrate the vivid word pictures painted in her speech. Jeanette also made it very obvious that she did not envy the instructor's task one little bit, hence the speech title of "Not in a Month of Sundays". A very thought provoking story line punctuated with humour, the highs and lows along with plenty of light hearted moments. The standout for me was how far Jeanette has come in a very short time.
Jeanette was evaluated by Helen, who not only gave a particularly good introduction but also a very helpful evaluation. Pania is fortunate to have members who provide inciteful suggestions for improvement along with praise on what speakers do well.Thank you Helen for your efforts today.Jeanette would have gained great benefit from what you said.

Darryl was our next speaker and "Pirates" was his title. Darryl's objectives in this assignment were to make us laugh, especially at the beginning and end of his speech. Well, he did give us a fantastic opening "avast ye lubbers!" he shouted, waving a cutlass in one hand and holding on to a pirate's hat with the other. His actions brought tears to my eyes. The play on words and one liners came thick and fast. The body of the speech gave us an insight as to history in the 1700's, most interesting, especially with regard to Black Beard. Darryl concluded with another burst of energy and plenty of humour. Loved the question "how much did pirate's earrings cost?" "A buccaneer' said Darryl. Well done and there were plenty more where that came from.
Barbara was up to her usual high standard with both her introduction and evaluation of Darryl's speech. He received plenty of praise with regard to his start and finish. Nice that Barbara said how much she liked the humour and why it held so much appeal to her. It was interesting to note that Darryl and Barbara interpreted the speech body in different ways, I could appreciate bioth points of view, made one think that's for sure! Thank you Barbara.

There was a lot more to this meeting with a Table Topics session and General Evaluation and if you want to know what those involve come along and see for yourself, everybody had the opportunity to speak and that's what Toastmasters is all about- taking part not just watching and listening!
Come along - we would love to see you.

Best Speaker; Jeanettte
Best Table Topic; Linda
Best Evaluator; Barbara

See you all next week and thanks Graeme for this report (with a little literary licence for the scribe!)