AREA 6 INTERNATIONAL SPEECH AND EVALUATION CONTEST

Club Member John represented Concord West Club in both the Area 6 International Speech Contest and the Evaluation Contest. 

John represented a reworked version of his speech – We Live in a Violent World – and took out First Place against 6 other Finalists from all the other Clubs in our area. Runner up was Alex Cameron from the Burwood Club.

In the evaluation Contest John drew spot number 5 out of 7 and was Runner Up to Alex Cameron who gave an exceptional Evaluation of the Target Speaker, presenting a speech on the English language.

Alex and John now go on to compete at the Division Contest at Bankstown Trotting club on Saturday 26^th March.

Photos of the event do not appear to have been posted as yet but may be up on the Blog at a future date. 

Not sure who was more surprised

Burwood Club’s Alex Cameron (Evaluation) and Concord West Club’s John Hughson (International)

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1100 – Tuesday 8th March 2011

SPEECHCRAFT 2011 SESSION ONE

Our One Thousand One Hundredth Meeting very appropriately was the first session in the series of 6 Speechcraft Meetings.

Formal apologies had been received from Dai Fei and Gavin who is unable to attend our meetings any further due to changing work circumstances.

Following the President’s Welcome from Brett, Paul took the helm as Chairman for the First Session. The Reading of the Mission of the Club was undertaken by Rama and the Grammarian Sam, introduced the Word of the Day – Recalcitrant.

As part of our Introductions, Chairman Paul asked us to recount what we each want to get out of the current Speechcraft Sessions whether we are participants, presenters or simply observers.

Following the Agenda Update by VPE Chris, Paul also took on the task of Leadership manual Evaluations.

The Guest Welcome was presented by Sam who welcomed Speechcrafters: Suda, Leonardo, Adam, Rama, Katrina, Megan and Isabelle. We also had Alexander, Annan, Lyndal and Earl visiting.

John was Toastmaster for the First Speechcraft Session and Introduced PP Peter who presented an interactive Introduction to Speechcraft which had all the Speechcrafters back on the feet to provide a brief synopsis of an interview they had each undertaken with a regular member.

Glenn H then presented a very lively and relaxed presentation on Strategies for Managing Nerves.

We had a shortened break in order to catch up on some time in the Second session Chaired by Glen H. The Toast was presented by Josh who had us focused on ‘The Present Moment’ in a very thought provoking toast.

Juliet was Toastmaster for the second speech session and as a first timer was most impressive.

She introduced Daniel who revisited his Ice Breaker Speech (probably for the umpteenth time) but provided an excellent insight into the tenure of Ice Breakers that would have been insightful for our Speechcrafters who will be required to deliver their Ice Breaker (First Speech) in a few weeks.

Daniel was Evaluated by Lyndel visiting from Hunters Hill Club and practicing her Evaluation technique in readiness for competing in her area competition in a few weeks. John was grateful that he is competing in a different Area Comp.

Kymberly who set us the challenge of being Authors presenting their newest work at a Book Launch presented the Table Topics segment. In true Table Topics style we were not made aware of the title of our new book until we had been ‘put on the spot. It was a highly enjoyable and challenging segment.

The Evaluators were PP Peter C and Paul M undertaking his first ever highly frenetic Table Topics Evaluation with great aplomb.

Paul M was back on his feet to kick off the rest of the evenings round up of Evaluations and feedback. Followed by Sam as Grammarian, Brett with Big Ears and Chris with the Timers Report.

Natasha undertook the General Evaluation summing up the evenings activities with great precision. VPE Chris oversaw the Forward Planning and President Brett gave an excellent round-up to the evenings proceedings.

COMING EVENTS

AREA 6 INTERNATIONAL & EVALUATION CONTEST: 

Saturday 12^th March at 12:30pm

NEXT MEETING: 

Tuesday 22^nd March Speechcraft No: 2

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1098 – Tuesday 8th February 2011

CLUB INTERNATIONAL AND EVALUATION CONTEST 2011-02-13

A very different format from our usual meetings started with a brief round of introductions lead by Club President Brett.

We were very fortunate to have a very large number of Visitors, Guests and very new Members to swell our ranks on a night when so many of our regular Members were unable to attend.

We also had current Area Governor Pauline and 2 members of Burwood Club in attendance with one of them to fulfil the role of target speaker for the Evaluation Contest.

Past President Peter led the formalities of the evening as Toastmaster outlining the rules and guidelines and introducing the Speakers.

We had 2 competitors in the Evaluation Contest.

John was the first speaker and kicked of with a speech entitled ‘We live in a Violent World’ in which John outlined some alarming statistics and challenged the audience to think about their own take on the concepts of violence that we are exposed to in our daily lives.

The second speaker was Daniel with a speech entitled ‘We all have quacks in our Lives’ and gave an inspiring account of dealing with a speech impediment and relating it closely to the current block-buster movie ‘The Kings Speech’, concluding with a personal account of helping to invoke confidence in a youngster who was challenged by a speech impediment.

(The Editor was inspired to go off and see the movie the next day and firmly endorses it as a Toastmaster ‘must-see’).

After all the judging and tallying had taken place we broke 10 minutes and resumed to a reiteration of the rules for the Evaluation Competition.

Sonia, the Target Speaker delivered a very strong speech on setting and achieving goals. Sonia was Evaluated by 5 competitors; Daniel, Brett, Glen H, John and Natasha.

Following all the judging and tallying the winners were announced. John took out the International Speech Contest and the Evaluation Contest with Brett the Runner Up in the Evaluation Contest. Competition guidelines for Timing became a factor in both contests.

John now goes onto the Area Competition on Saturday 12^th March at Burwood Club.

John accepting his International Speech Award and Club President Brett 

accepting his Evaluation Runner Up Award from Area Governor Pauline

COMING EVENTS

BRING A FRIEND NIGHT: Tuesday 22^nd February

SPEECHCRAFT 2011 COMMENCES: Tuesday 8^th March 2011

AREA 6 INTERNATIONAL & EVALUATION CONTEST: Saturday 12^th March at 12:30pm

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1096 – Tuesday 14th December 2010

To end the year – and look forward to the new decade we will record just a brief overview of the last meeting in 2010.

Apologies were received from Gavin and Bernard while a couple of other members fell victim to the unpredictability of the ‘silly season’ commitments.

S@A Daniel got us underway and handed over to Chairman Sam for the first session. Bishnu read the Mission of the Club and Peter presented the Word of the Day – Pundit.

Introductions were accompanied by a brief outline of our intended plans for Christmas Day. Before VPE Chris undertook some last minute Agenda Updates and DG Philip took on the task of Leadership Manual evaluations and Bishnu formally welcomed Mary Lou, Cedric, Annant and Rama as Visitors for the evening.

The Toastmaster for the First Speech Session was Kimberley introducing Dai Fei with her tenth speech entitled ‘Success Through Self Belief’; Dai Fei was Evaluated by John who encouraged Dai Fei to consider this speech for future Competition. This completes Dai Fei Competent Communicator Manual and the Club congratulates her on a sterling effort in record time.

The second Speaker was Sandra who presented an excellent 5^th Speech on the benefits and trials of Swimming. Sandra has picked up her Competent Communicator manual from previous membership of another club and it great to get that injection of experience into our Speeches. Sandra was as to be expected, very ably Evaluated by Paul.

Daniel brought us back from the break and handed the gavel to Dai Fei as Chairperson for the Second Session, who then stepped up to the role of Toastmaster for the Second Speech Session. Dai Fei introduced PP Peter to deliver a very moving recollection an accident in his past entitled ‘Will I Walk Again’. Peter was Evaluated by Sam who made some very forensic observations of Peter’s wealth of experience in speech making.

Natasha who took us into some fascinating new areas requiring 2 simultaneous participants then presented Table Topics. One delivering the monologue in response to a question or prompt while the other acted out the perceived actions.

It led to some riotous interpretations and really challenged to speakers to understand the importance of body movement – particularly when you are required to – not – demonstrate body action.

The complex case of Evaluation fell to Philip to Evaluate the Speakers while Glenn D had the even greater challenge of Evaluating the Actors. It was all great fun, with some very worthwhile lessons in presentation.

Gary undertook the final Evaluations for the evening for Ums and Ahs. Peter presented his Grammarian Report with his Word of The Day Award. Paul delivered Big Ears while Chris delivered the Timers Report. Glen H had the task of wrapping up the whole meeting with the General Evaluation and Chris took us briefly through the Forward Planner.

The guests made some very favourable observations of the evening’s program before VPE Chris stood in for President Brett in the Closing Remarks, wishing every one a very Happy Christmas and a Great New Year.

NEXT MEETING Tuesday 18th January 2011

INTERNATIONAL SPEECH CLUB COMPETITION: Tuesday 8th February

BRING A FRIEND NIGHT: Tuesday 22nd February

SPEECHCRAFT: March 2011

2ND ANNUAL AREA 6 COMBINED TOASTMASTERS CHRISTMAS PARTY

Another great night organised by Host Club Yaralla Toastmasters saw a good 40+ folk from 3 local Toastmaster Clubs get together for a very enjoyable end-of-year celebration. 

Along with a rolling Table Topics ‘storyline’ which challenged a number of folk from all the Clubs, we enjoyed good company, enjoyable food, relaxing drinks and a visit from Santa. 

Plus we had the pleasure of Christmas Giving with a ‘Wishing Tree’ style collection of Goodies to be distributed by the Benevolent Society. 

A big thank you to Yaralla Toastmasters for another great evening.

Area Govenor Pauline also took the opportunity to formally present our very own Peter Crosby with the Area 6 Humorous Trophy for his success in this year’s Area humorous Speech Competition.

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1095 – Tuesday 23 November 2010

A slightly abridged overview of our last formal meeting which was very well attended with 19 regulars and 2 visitors.

Daniel called us to Order at 7:15pm sharp and was followed by our President Brett’s Welcome and the Chairman for the first Session; Bernard kicked us off asking Paul M to Read the Mission of the Club.

Chairman Bernard then challenged us to recount our ‘Worst Bad Haircut’ with our Introductions. There were no apologies and a very succinct Agenda Update managed by VPE Chris. Peter C took on the task of the Leadership manual Evaluations.

Gavin presented the Guest Welcome to Marilou and Juliet.

Sam was the Toastmaster for the First Prepared Speech Session and introduced Chris who delivered a riveting speech No:7 entitled “Pandemic, Coming to a Cinema Near You”. Daniel very ably evaluated Chris.

The second speakers was Dai Fei who delivered speech No:9 entitled “Dancing is Good for You”. So good in fact that Dai Fei had us all up on feet tripping the light fantastic. Brett provided an encore performance with his Evaluation of Dai Fei’s presentation.

Following a very punctual 10-minute break, John was chairman for the Second Session and handed the floor to Sam for The Toast, who presented a very timely dedication to ‘The Rescuers’.

Bishnu did a sterling job in his first role as Toastmaster for the Second Session of speeches introducing Josh with an excellent explanation of the banking system in his speech entitled “The Goldsmith’s Tale”. Josh very capably evaluated Gary.

Adam was Table Topics Master for the meeting and as is to be expected of Adam, challenged us with a Fortune Cookie scenario which provoked some very humorous and surprisingly ‘deep’ responses including participation by our Visitors.

John Evaluated the Odd numbered speakers, while Bernard Evaluated the Even numbered speakers. Great fun!

The evenings wrap up and Evaluations were undertaken by a variety of members. Sandra tackled her first Ums and Ahs Count. Gavin had taken on Grammarian and Word of the Day ‘Mollycoddle’ while Dai Fei had been working on her throwing action in distributing incentives for good listeners with her Big Ear’s Report.

The Timer’s Report was delivered by Glenn D and the General Evaluation was eloquently presented by Paul V.

The night concluded with very favourable Guest Comments and the President’s Closing Remarks. There was a reminder regarding the upcoming Combined Area 6 Christmas Party at Concord Bowling Club on Wednesday 8^th December.

NEXT MEETING Tuesday 14th December 2010

CONCORD WEST CLUB’S NEW BANNER

It was decided at a recent Club Executive Meeting – in the absence of any sign of our original Club Banner – to re-order a new Banner. It was therefore fortuitous that our new banner arrived the same night that our Area Governor Pauline was visiting our Club and permitted her to partake in a small formal unfurling of our new banner. The banner reminds us of just how distinguished the Concord West Club is as it was one of the very first Toastmaster Clubs to be chartered in Australia back in 1962. Which means we are on the cusp of our 50th Anniversary in 2012.

Past President Peter (currently Club Treasuer 2010-11) and Area Govenor Pauline presenting the new Club Banner to the Club at the meeting on 26th October 2010.