CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1106 – Tuesday 14th June 2011

INAUGURAL DEBATE

Debate Toastmaster Natasha introducing the Affirmative Team (Left) and Negative Team (Right)

In the (rare) absence of our S@A Daniel, Kymberly called the meeting to order and handed over to Club President Brett for his Welcome and the meeting over to the Chairman for the First Session Philip.

Apologies were received from Paul V and we Welcomed Visitors Edmond and Sandra.

Vicki read the Reading of the Mission of the Club and Grammarian Paul M presented the Word of the Day. The Word ‘Ingenuous’ was presented to the members for strategic inclusion during the meeting.

Chairman Philip then asked for Introductions with a theme of; “Recent Successes” which provided scope for a variety of close and personal revelations.

VPE Chris took us through a fairly significant Agenda Update while Bernard took on the task of Leadership Manual Evaluations.

District Governor Philip Bendeich then made a special presentation to the Club for the District 70 Print Media Award for 2011 (See separate posting).

Toastmaster for the First Session was Natasha who outlined the guidelines for the Debate and introduced the Topic – ‘Ignorance is Bliss’ and the combatants. For the Affirmative: Josh, Vicki and Glen H, while the Negative team were: Brett, Chris and Peter C.

Overall there were some splendid arguments presented by both sides, personal and analytical. Participants had met prior to the meeting in order to refine their positions and some detailed research was also evident in their deliveries.

All participants kept to time and followed the guidelines of a debate making for a thoroughly entertaining and informative session, which amply demonstrated the objectives encouraged by Toastmasters. An excellent showcase for what they have achieved in their involvement in our Club across a variety of months and years of membership.

We went to the Break while the 2 Evaluators and the Toastmaster retired to consider both their evaluations and the winner of the evening’s debate.

Kymberley called us to Order again and Natasha resumed the roll of Toastmaster for the Second Session.

John had the task of providing an Evaluation for the Affirmative Team and the individual Affirmative speakers, and was followed by Kymberley providing an Evaluation for the Negative team and speakers, while avoiding revealing the outcome.

Natasha then presented the Winning Awards to the Negative Team while outlining some of the key issues that got them across the line.

Overall an excellent evening and full credit must go to our VPM Natasha for all the organisational effort that she put into such splendid inaugural Debate.

President Brett then conducted a follow-up Election for outstanding Executive positions for 2011-12. It was announced that Paul M had chosen to fill the role of Sergeant-of-Arms leaving the role of Club Treasurer vacant. Nominations were then received and seconded for Sam as Treasurer. The role of Vice President Marketing/PR remains vacant at this stage.

The current VPPR John is most willing to assist anyone who would be keen to consider this role and you can contact him to ask any questions you might have about the role.

The evening concluded with the standard Evaluations from Ums and Ahs (Sam), Grammarian (Paul M), Big Ears (Megan standing in for Katrina who had to leave early) and Timers Report (Sandra in collaboration with Dai Fei). The General Evaluation was presented by Paul C and Forward Planning by Chris.

Our Guests were invited to make an observation of the evening and President Brett delivered his Closing remarks.

(LtoR) Toastmaster Natasha with the winning Negative Team, Peter C, Chris and Brett

UPCOMING EVENTS

Saturday 25^th June – District Changeover; Liverpool Catholic Club

Tuesday 28th June – Next Meeting

Tuesday 12^th July – Executive Change Over Evening

CONCORD WEST TAKES OUT A DISTRICT 70 AWARD

Vice President Marketing & Public Relations John being presented with the 

2011 District Print Media Award by District Governor Philip Bendeich.

Concord West Toastmasters has taken out the 2011 District Award for the Best Print Media for our recent Club Brochure. This Award announced at the recent District 70 Conference is awarded to the best Print Media produced by any one of the over 350 Clubs across eastern NSW from New England in the north to the Riverina in the south.

The principles behind the production of this Brochure were 3 fold;

Firstly to provide information about the format and structure of an ‘average’ Toastmaster’s meeting to take away any perceived ‘mystery’ that might surround a our meeting for those people interested but unsure about what constitutes Toastmaster membership.

Secondly in using regular members of our Club in albeit candid photographs, we aim to project a balanced ‘humanity’ and ‘personality’ of our Club so that new comers can have a sense of already knowing our members.

Finally, to present our Club in a professional light, by adhering to the Toastmasters International (design) Brand and keeping the layout, clean and simple without irrelevant design tricks. In doing so we are projecting an image that avoids looking amateurish and irrelevant. It is vital that whatever collateral we send out to the general public … speaks on our behalf … in a manner that best represents our intended aims and objectives.

We were most fortunate that we could be represented at the District 70 Conference by our long-standing Club Member and former Club President Philip Bendeich who coincidently is also District 70 Governor this year.

Philip in turn was able to attend our last meeting on 14^th June 2011 and passed on the presentation to our Club Vice President of Marketing and Public Relations John who had produced the award winning Brochure.

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1105 – Tuesday 24th May 2011

Club President Brett presenting Competent Communicator Awards to Chris and Glen H 

and Competent Leader Award to John at the conclusion of the evenings meeting.

S@A Daniel got us underway and handed the meeting over to Brett for his President's Opening Remarks and provided an overview of a busy night’s program and a Guest Welcome for Vicki returning for her second meeting. 

Formal apologies had been received from Kimberly.
Natasha chaired the first half of the meeting while Glenn D volunteered to read the Mission of the Club.

Grammarian Paul V introduced the Word of the day – Verdigris – challenging us to introduce this intrusting expression into the evening’s proceedings.

Introductions were accompanied by a brief account of how we may have been scammed and brought out an array of interesting and somewhat alarming personal experiences as well as some humorous anecdotes.

VPE Chris had a few complicated Agenda Updates to wade through, but pulled it together as always.

Leadership Manual Evaluations were managed by VPPR John.

Daniel was Toastmaster for the first Speech Session and introduced Peter C who delivered a Folk Tale from the Entertaining Speakers Manual #1. With an extended time frame, Peter delivered a very paced and meticulous account of one of the all time great Fawlty Towers Episodes – A Touch of Class. Peter was ably Evaluated by Bernard in his first Prepared Speech Evaluation.

The second Prepared Speech segment was Club President delivering the President‘s summary of the preceding year entitled: Moments of Truth. Although supported by a Toastmaster PowerPoint this 20-minute presentation provides the President’s overview of the year in terms of the Club’s successes and challenges. It serves as a timely report for the incoming Executive members. There is no Evaluation of this presentation.

Going to the Break overtime we reconvened after a shorten adjournment and Daniel as Chairman introduced John as the Toastmaster of the second half of the meeting which was also the final Speechcraft Session. We were joined at this point by a Visitor, Aidan.

The Final Educational – Mentoring – was delivered by Chris who outlined both the strategies and shared responsibilities in successfully mentoring.
Club President Brett then chaired the Club Executive Elections for 2011/12.
Nominated and elected unopposed where: John Club President, Kimberly Vice President Education, Bernard Vice President Membership, Secretary Glenn D and Brett automatically assumes the role of Immediate Past President. Nominations are yet to be fielded for Vice President Public Relations and Sergeant of Arms.

Brett also thanked the outgoing members of the Executive for their contribution over the past year.

Meghan then conducted her first ever Table Topics and following a well-prepared introduction took us on a cognitive journey asking speakers to choose an item at random and speak to it. The results were both intriguing and challenging. Chris and Peter presented the Evaluations with the level of experience we have come to expect from these members.

The evenings final Evaluations were the Ums and Ahs by Glenn D, Grammarian by Paul with 2 members introducing ‘Verdigris’ into their presentations. Natasha conducted the Big Ears segment and Katrina tackled the taxing roll of Timer for the first time. Glen H very capably rolled out the evening’s General Evaluation.

Forward Planning and Guests Comments were followed by formal Presentations to Chris and Glen H for achieving their Competent Communicators and John for achieving his Competent Leader.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Tuesday 14th June – The Great Debate

Tuesday 12^th July – Executive Change Over Evening

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1104 – Tuesday 17th May 2011

GUEST EDITOR – VPE CHRIS

Daniel opened the meeting which was to include a number of firsts and Brett gave the President's Welcome, and specifically welcomed our 4 guests; Vicki, Chrissy, Steve, Earl. 

 

Glen was Chairman for the first half of the meeting and kept the meeting running smoothly including shuffling agenda items so that members running late could still fulfil their roles. The introductory question was what were people's thoughts on the Federal Budget being announced that night. A lot of the responses indicated that it was all a bit “ho hum”, and a member who would prefer to remain anonymous recognised that it introduced “opportunities” for further tax savings.

Peter presented the Word of the Day as ‘cognisant’ and 2 members managed to use the word appropriately throughout the meeting.

Kimberley was Toastmaster of the Educational Session, which included a run-down on how to deliver an appropriate Toast inside and outside the Toastmasters environment, presented by Sam, and an overview of the Club Executive Roles presented by Paul. Both sessions were well received by the audience.

Paul V, who replicated the professional job that Glen had demonstrated in the first half, chaired the second half of the meeting. It began with Juliet Toasting Irene, a lady that had helped abused people through a charity for a number of years. This was her first toast and was presented with a lot of passion and demonstrated great preparation.

Katrina was Toastmaster of the Second Speech Session. This was also the first time Katrina had been Toastmaster of a prepared speech session and she appeared calm and remembered all the appropriate formalities. The first speech was delivered by Brett who managed to draw a comparison between the width of the railway gauge in the US and a horses backside, and link it to the powerful lesson that we shouldn't do things just because they were always done that way. Kimberley's speech was an informative and entertaining journey through the life of a potato from the farm to the chip packet. The speeches were Evaluated by Natasha and Chris respectively. They both were very positive evaluations and highlighted some areas for improvement including examples.

Table Topics was run creatively by Glen. Each speaker was posed with a confronting question at a dinner party, either attacking their job or their favourite hobby. The speakers all responded passionately and as such all spoke for longer than the allocated time. The speakers were Paul M, Earl, Juliet, Meghan, Peter, Chris, Sam, Daniel, Kimberley. Natasha and Paul M evaluated them, and both provided general and specific helpful feedback.

The final Evaluation items for the meeting were as follows:
 - Kimberley counted the Um's and Ah's. She was sensitive to those that had high numbers and also accurately picked up additional filler words beyond just ums and ahs.
 - Peter was the Grammarian and managed to pick up an example of grammar that we could improve upon whilst also highlighting many positive examples particularly some quite visual phrases used by the prepared speakers.
 - Paul delivered the Big Ears segment. Although he ran out of prizes early, people still enthusiastically tested their listening skills trying to remember who had said the various unique phrases.
 - Meghan was the Timer for the evening and this was another first for the meeting. She fought with the stop-watch all night, but still managed to keep her cool and deliver an accurate and professional report.
 - Daniel gave the General Evaluation of all participants not already evaluated for the evening and provided some helpful tips for improvement and recognised the great efforts of members fulfilling roles particularly those that were first timers on the night.

Announcements for the evening included Natasha unveiling the composition of the Teams, the Evaluators and the Topic for the Debate Meeting coming up on the 14th of June. The topic for the debate is “Ignorance is Bliss”. The writer was very embarrassed to have never heard of this saying (just warming up for my role on the Negative Team).

In his usual style, Brett closed the meeting in a positive manner telling us his success story about how practising at Toastmasters has helped him cut the high number of ums and ahs he had in his speeches when he first began as a member to regularly saying none now.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Tuesday 24th May – Final Speechcraft Session 6

Tuesday 14th June – The Great Debate

Tuesday 12th June – New Club Executive

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1103 – Tuesday 28th April 2011

SPEECHCRAFT SESSION FOUR

S@A Daniel opened the meeting and handed the Meeting to VPE Chris in the absence of President Brett and handed the gavel to Glen H as Chairman for the first Session.

Apologies had been received from Peter and Brett. Chris Welcomed both Guests and returning Visitors including Lyndel, Marco and Jennifer. Area Governor Pauline was conducting her last Club Inspection as Area Governor for 2010/11 and was also officiating in a later presentation.

Paul M read the Mission of the Club before Glen H presented the Word of the Day – “Vilification”. Glen H then sort Introductions and a response to what the recent Easter/ANZAC weekend had meant to each member invoking a diversity of comments and insights as always.

Chris had a fairly complex task of rearranging the Agenda Update but experience bore fruit. Chris also took on the task of Leadership Manual Evaluations.

Daniel was the Toastmaster for the First Speaking Session and introduced 2 new Speechcraft Educationals delivered by Kymberly – on Impromptu Speaking and John – on Giving Feedback. Both highly experienced speakers provided great insight into their respective topics.

We went to the break on time and were reconvened by S@A Daniel handing control of the meeting to Kymberly as the second Chairperson.

Adam G delivered his first Toast in a meeting and took us back to the purpose of the recent ANZAC weekend.

Chris was the Toastmaster for the second Prepared Speech Session and introduced 2 speakers.

Josh delivered another excellent speech – number 6 from the Competent Communicator Manual – Vocal Variety – with an inspirational speech entitled “Stuck in a Rut”. Josh again demonstrated his extraordinary ability to speak without any notes and deliver a metered and well-paced speech.

Paul M then delivered his First Speech – The Ice breaker – and stunned us with not only a very polished first speech but an intriguing insight into his life with his topic – “My Need for Speed”, relating his longstanding love affair with car racing. Not just watching it… but doing it! Including driving a blistering lap of Mount Panorama in a V8 Super Car.

Natasha and Daniel provided the respective Evaluations demonstrating their experience and understanding of the purpose of Evaluations.

At extremely short notice Josh took on the challenge of conducting Table Topics and had numerous members describe what it was like to be reincarnated as a variety of animals. A lot of fun.

Bernard and Glen H took on the onerous task of Evaluating the Odd and Even numbered Speakers and keeping track of each presentation.

The evenings other Evaluations were started off by first timer, Katrina who took on the Ums and Ahs Count. Glen H was able to award Easter eggs for a couple of people who used variations of the Word of the Day – Vilification – and provided some feedback to both excellent and curious uses of Grammar throughout the meeting. Another first timer, Megan similarly rewarded a number of good listeners with the Big Ears presentation. Leo then presented his first Timer’s Report. All with great distinction.

Visitor Lyndal demonstrated her vast experience with a well-structured General Evaluation of the evening’s proceedings before Chris handed the meeting to Area Governor Pauline for her observations and the presentation to John of the Perpetual Trophy for the Area 6 International Speech Contest for 2011.

It is worth noting that a number of current and recent past members of Concord West Club are significantly represented on the names engraved on this Trophy including; Daniel 1997, 1999 and 2001, John 2009 and 2011 and Adam B 2010.

Final announcements included a reminder of the upcoming Great Debate in June.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Tuesday 10th May – Speechcraft Session 5

Tuesday 24th May – Speechcraft Session 6

Tuesday 14th June – The Great Debate

2011 Area 6 International Speech Contest Winner John being presented with the area 6 Perpetual Trophy, 

by Area Governor Pauline.

CONCORD WEST TOASTMASTERS MEETING No: 1102 – Tuesday 12th April 2011

SPEECHCRAFT 2011 SESSION THREE

SPECIAL GUEST EDITOR – VPE CHRIS

Daniel opened the meeting on time and Chris (in Brett's temporary absence) gave the President's Welcome including welcoming our 3 guests; Lyndal, Raghu and Samatha.

 

Kimberley was Chairman for both sessions of the meeting and kept it running smoothly as well as keeping it appropriately light hearted. The introductory question was what was our favourite movie and there were some varying responses from Wind Talkers to Love Actually.

Peter introduced the Word of the Day as "Ubiquitous" and 3 members managed to use the word appropriately throughout the meeting.

Natasha was Toastmaster of the Educational Session which included tips for delivering an Introduction delivered by Glenn and some hints regarding appropriate use of Body Language delivered by Josh.

The second half of the meeting began with Glen Toasting our current VPE, Chris, for his hard work so far during the year.

The Speech Session was chaired by Daniel and included Chris' final speech in his Competent Communicator titled 5, talking about his favourite holiday spots. Brett's speech was a persuasive speech delivered in character as a lawyer designed to prove his clients innocent of all charges. Glenn and Lyndal ably evaluated the speeches respectively, providing helpful hints for further improvement.

Table Topics was run by Natasha, and as usual Natasha came up with a very different way to run the session. The speakers were all selected at the start and one by one asked to continue on from the previous speaker in developing a story about a time traveller. Natasha came up with an appropriate introduction for Peter to speak from. Other speakers were Juliet, Chris, Raghu (visitor ably participating in Table Topics for the first time), Lyndal and Josh. Brett and Glen, who picked up some positive aspects of the Table Topics, which everyone could learn from, Evaluated the speakers.

The summary items for the meeting were as follows:
• Juliet counted the Um's and Ah's. This was her first time and she was very attentive.
• Peter was the Grammarian and managed to pick up a few aspects of our grammar that we could improve upon whilst highlighting some quite pleasing aspects including clever uses of alliteration.
• Kimberley delivered the Big Ears segment and demonstrated some very accurate throwing skills as well as some challenging phrases.
• Bernard was the Timer for the evening and gave a great introduction into the benefits of learning from the timing role and pointed out individuals who went over time by more than 25%.
• Paul gave the General Evaluation of all participants not already evaluated for the evening and ably covered all members and roles.

Announcements for the evening included Natasha promoting the Debate Meeting that is coming up on the 14th of June. In replacement of the normal Prepared Speeches, there will be a debate comprised of 3 speakers each on opposing teams.

In his usual style, Brett closed the meeting in a very positive manner.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Tuesday 26th April – Speechcraft Session 4

Tuesday 10th May – Speechcraft Session 5

Tuesday 24th May – Speechcraft Session 6

Tuesday 14th June – The Great Debate

DIVISIONAL INTERNATIONAL AND SPEECH COMPETITION – Saturday 28th March 2011

Concord West Club member John in the International Competition, while Burwood Club member Alex Cameron took on the Evaluation Contest, represented Area 6 Toastmaster’s at the recent Divisional Competition held at the Bankstown Trotting Club.

It is not appropriate for the Editor to make comment on his own speech, ‘We Live in a Violent World’ suffice to say that marginally loosing his way on 2 occasions and leaving out a key point, apparently went unnoticed by some very generous observers.

Alex Cameron put in a sterling effort with his first ever foray into this level of Competition.

Both John and Alex drew number 8 (out of 8) Speakers, which is not, the ideal position to be in, in either Competition. But it is literally the luck of the draw.

The eventual winners on the day are both old hands at this level of Competition. The International Speech – which is intended to inspire the audience to change their thinking or evoke a response – was won for the third year in a row by a young chap whose topic this year was how he felt after his girlfriend dumped him.

The winner of the Evaluation Contest was also the winner last year and has developed a very polished formula for addressing this style of competition.

The real key to competing at this level however is the self-challenge. Tackling a large audience, handling nerves, copious practice and dealing with issues of self-confidence.

It is highly recommended to all Toastmaster members to – give Contests a go!

Finally, John would like to thank President Brett and club members Glenn D and Bernard for their attendance and support.

John being presented his Divisional Participation Certificate 

at the 2011 International Speech Contest by the Toastmistress