"FINDING OTHER WORLDS!"

This was the intriguing title of our one speech today at Pania's meeting, Darryl set out the Solar System for us and explained it extremely well, under the guidance of our Toastmaster of the day , Anna, who ran a very efficient meeting that finished right on time!

"ARE YOU READY FOR YOUR KINDNESS CHALLENGE?"

“Are you Ready for your Kindness Challenge?”

May 25^th Pania Toastmaster’s meeting was entertained by Carol who gave a 10 to 12 minute speech. The speech illustrated the style of presentation she does to promote one of her businesses. The props used created a very colourful appearance within the meeting room and this also enhanced the overall atmosphere of the meeting.

Mike evaluated Carol and he found both commendations and recommendations, which is in line with the ‘CRC’ method of evaluation, ‘commend, recommend, commend’. When this method is used to appraise a speech the recommendations are more easily accepted by the speaker as they appear very helpful as opposed to being critical.

Carol finished her speech off by offering us all ‘The 7 Day Kindness Challenge’ and Mike finished off by suggesting he and Carol discuss the projects objectives to decide if they had actually been meet satisfactorily.

Stephanie created six most interesting Table Topics for; Craig, Darryl, Mike, Carol, Helen and Patrick to reply to in one minute. Table Topics is an excellent way of practicing spontaneous speaking. This can be a most useful tool to have especially when it comes to work interviews or answering teenager’s questions.

During the business session Craig gave a quick review of the recent District Conference in Wellington where Amy from Napier Club was placed third in the International Speech Contest and Craig was unplaced in the District Evaluation Contest.

Patrick went onto evaluate each Table Topic speaker in a very enthusiastic manner. Patrick was actually asked to give a table topic speech and he very cleverly asked another member to evaluate himself. This led to a complete evaluation and the presentation of the ‘Best Table Topic’ award going to Darryl rounded off that part of the meeting very nicely.

The General Evaluator, Helen, summarised the meeting and evaluated the evaluators.                                                                       This was followed by the presentation of the Best Speaker award to Carol and Best Evaluator’s award to Patrick.

Helen also thanked Sandy for doing a fine job as Chairman of the meeting. This was Sandy’s first time in the role and as she has been unable to attend a meeting for several weeks, a very big round of applause must go out to her!

Well done Members and see you all at next weeks’ meeting.

"Turning Tides Convention Report"

On the Weekend of 12th to 14th May the semi-annual Toastmaster’s Convention was held in Shed 6 (next to ASB Arena,on the Wellington waterfront). Almost 400 Toastmasters from around the country attended to see the District Evaluation and International Speech Contests and attend the Council meeting plus Educationals and Keynote speaker addresses.

"EVALUATE- YOUR BODY SPEAKS!"

Our meeting on Thursday 18th May was attended by only 11 members, probably due to the sudden 'extreme cold' and the expected squall which arrived during the meeting. Carol stepped in at the last minute as Toastmaster and ran an excellent meeting, which was entertaining and educational. her flowery program certainly brightened up the day!!

"ON YOUR BIKE!!"

It was a small, but enthusiastic group of Toastmasters who braved the cooler temperatures to attend today’s (11th May) meeting. However, we soon warmed after joining in the meeting programme. We were ably looked after by our Toastmaster of the day Craig who had to negotiate a few changes to the program. He kept us entertained by a variety of interesting dates and events as well as finding time to prepare a last-minute speech.

I enjoy the grammar component when we have time in the programme and Laurel, our grammarian of the day, presented us with the very pertinent ‘prattle’ as our word of the day.

Graeme introduced Craig’s speech which required the use of visual aids. Craig then took us on a virtual bike ride along some of his favourite rides from among the 200km long bike pathways of the local area. By giving us a map to follow as he spoke and personal examples, I am sure there will soon be more riders from TM joining him on the pathways in future. 

Graeme’s evaluation was masterful with a re-iteration of the objectives, lots of warm praise for the speaker and 3 useful recommendations.

·         Give sources of facts for increased credibility, use large visuals to avoid talking to the board and stay on topic. 

This type of feedback not only assists the speaker, but it also serves as a useful reminder for other members to observe when they are preparing their own speeches.

The Club Executive Election was then held run by President Helen and the following committee was elected to oversee the running of the Club from 1st July to 30th June 2018.

President; Marc

V/P Education; Craig

V/P Membership; Helen

V/P Public Relations; Patrick

Treasurer;Carol

Secretary; Linda

Sgt-@arms; Graeme

Many thanks to Anna & Jen for their input over the past 12 months and until 30th June 2017!!

Table topics by David was cleverly aimed at specific speakers and the destinations that they had experienced, but the topics were also broad enough to allow all members to think of their own travel stories. It was good to have the chance to hear from a range of excellent speakers.

·         Jen started us off by enthusiastically talking about a very special trip to New York. With her memories of wonderful food, warm people and things to see, it sounds like a ‘must see’ destination.

·         Marcus waxed lyrically about Christchurch in winter, albeit from behind glass and accompanied by the warmth of the sun, to enjoy frosty vistas, clear blue skies and avoid the smog.

·         Laurel recounted her experiences of culture shock when working in Fiji, and not as a tourist in her bikini on its sandy beaches. Group cultures are a challenge that often confront the Western traveller and this reminded us of the rewards of engaging in a culture rather than judging it by our own cultural standards.

·         Helen is a B & B hostess with the ‘mostess’ and she outlined the business model which supports her establishment and how it feels from personal experience when things aren’t tailored for visitors comfort.

·         Carol recounted her memories of growing up in a large family on a dairy farm. Feeding the chickens, collecting eggs, checking the baler for ‘critters’ and slipping in gumboots through mud with her townie friends, bought back memories for me too.

Darryl gave warm feedback to all participants, which was well-deserved, as they all gave excellent responses to their topics. With such good talks that it was not surprising that Darryl struggled to give recommendations.

Thanks goes to our team, Graeme, Ian, David and Craig who set the room up for us each meeting. 

Warmest wishes for Craig as he competes in the Evaluation contest in Wellington.

Best Speaker: Craig

Best Evaluator: Graeme

Best Table Topic: Jen

General Evaluator: Linda reported well on the meeting and was assisted by the Timekeeper, Carol and Grammarian Laurel, who did not prattle on!!

"FEEDBACK- LYING WILL BE THE DEATH OF YOU!"

Feedback – Lying will be the death of you

Well we had such a powerful meeting on Thursday 4th.  We were led by one of Pania’s most experienced Toastmasters, Laurel  who started us on time and got Ian to read the Mission Statement.  Craig introduced Helen who performed a play from the Interpretive Reading Manual, Project 4 and this will complete her Advanced Communicator Gold Award.  Helen formed a play by herself called “An Insurance Salesman”.  We experienced a waiting room in which three different personalities sat waiting.  We had to discover what they were waiting for by listening to the play.  It was extremely entertaining and were totally engrossed.  It was in fact a waiting room for the next advancement after death.  All three had died and it was the insurance salesman that was the common denominator.  Helen left us hanging as we still don’t know how they all got to the waiting room in the first place!  I guess we will just have to WAIT for another play to find that out!  Well done to Helen.  Craig was not sure what they were waiting for either but gave great feedback to Helen in his evaluation!  Craig said Helen had researched her characters well and used great hand gestures. Craig commended Helen on her voice changes and her changes in each character in the play. Craig also said her set up of her props and the stage for the play was cleverly executed.  Recommendations - Craig felt more voice changes in pitch for each character was needed (which Craig demonstrated) and different body languages for each character.  Craig finished by saying Helen had done a tremendous job and overall had an excellently presented assignment.

Next Mike Coombe talked to us about Effective Evaluation.  Mike was also going for the Penultimate award of the ACG.  He commented that he was feeling golden already!  Mike enthralled us with a lovely PowerPoint presentation on being an effective evaluator.  Mike told us about using the CRC method of Commend Recommend Commend.  He told us to try using two or three areas of improvement for the speaker to improve on and to write these down so the speaker can reference this later - try to finish on a high when giving an evaluation.  Mike also talked about giving evaluations is the third person which sparked a debate amongst the members.  Some members felt speaking in the third person was not required whilst others felt it was a requirement.  Overall a good robust discussion was had with all agreeing to disagree.  Mike will be presenting a Part Two to this at a later stage. 

Laurel then took Table Topics and Darryl selected “the Biggest Lie he ever told” and proceeded to tell another one.  Why do we lie?.....to get out of trouble and to impress somebody!  Stephanie selected “For which two qualities could an employer recommend you?” Stephanie said integrity but lies are not good in professionalism.  Patrick got “what is the best offer you’ve ever turned down?”  To which, Patrick said it was NOT an offer from his wife to move to the South Island.  However, he turned down an offer working for someone else and started working for himself.

General Evaluator, Carol summed the meeting up proficiently with the help of the Timekeeper, Graeme.

The meeting finished on time – absolutely no lie!

Best Speaker:  Helen

Best Table Topic: Darryl

Best Evaluator; Craig

'FEEDBACK- GIVE IT GOOD OR BAD!"

Feedback – Give it Good or Bad

Wow, what a great meeting we had. We were immediately welcomed into a meeting room that was set up completely differently than it has been in the past – you knew there was a new Toastmaster for this week!  We started on time, went through a slight road bump as we couldn’t find the stop watch and then the Toastmaster read the Mission Statement.