November 22nd - last general meeting for 2013

Never mind the number - feel the quality! That adaptation is based on the title of a comedy on TV I think, and my version captures the spirit of the club's last meeting for this calendar year.

We may have been few, but the two speeches had considerable merit, and members came up with some excellent improvisations in Table Topics. The word of the day was 'lightning', which was relatively easy to incorporate into our speaking roles.

With the meeting proceeding at a good pace (though not lightning fast, which would have been too quick), we were able to spend a useful amount of time on club business at the end of the meeting. The next executive meeting is in early December and we members needed to have a chance to put in our thoughts on the topics that will be discussed.

Sandy gave her third or fourth speech, Project 4: Get to the Point, in the Competent Communication manual. Sandy certainly 'got to the point' as she presented a practice run-through of a speech she will be giving for work reasons in a few weeks time. The 'point' of her speech was to introduce the charity she runs, and how it sets about achieving its overarching purpose, and Sandy used her 5 - 7 minutes (actually Sandy spoke for six and a half minutes) to give us, her audience, an informative overview. Evaluating the speech later in the meeting, Peter noted many strong points and made one valuable recommendation.

Ann's speech was the first in the Competent Communication manual, the Icebreaker. Ann has done these 10 projects before and is redoing the manual now to revisit the techniques that the manual teaches. Noting that spring and the opening of a new Parliament both lead to a large amount of ice-breaking, she attempted to introduce the Canberra she knows, rather than herself. Ann's Canberra is noted for its people's volunteering spirit, its bushland, and the way its citizens show initiative in so many ways, from opening small businesses to government leadership on carbon neutrality and other issues.

Watch this blog space for announcement of the first meeting for 2014, which will be either the 31st January or the 24th (probably the 31st), and may be in a new room at the university.

Best wishes for a restful seasonal break and new year.

Report on Benjamin Toastmasters meeting 1011, 8 November 2013. A low turnout required Iaonon to rejig the agenda. Despite the low turnout the meeting was successful. Geoff provided word of the day - "support", at little notice. Speaker 1 was Keiko, doing project 4 from the Advanced Communication Manual - The Touching Story. Keiko gave a very moving story about some old school friends. It certainly brought a tear to my eyes, and the evaluator Dominic was also clearly moved. Keko's use of pauses was particularly effective. Ianon took on the role of TableTopics Master. Each speaker drew a coin at random, and had to describe what happened to them in the year of coinage. Geoff gave a rather rambling history of his year 2008. Dominic got to speak of the year he finished uni and was let loose on the world. Linda focussed on her photography in 2011, Keiko spoke of a positive change in her work, and Ainon got the happiest year of all - the year she retired. This class of topic actually turned out to be challenging for many speakers, as we couldn't all remember significant happenings from random years in the past. We already have a number of apologies for the next meeting, so everyone available should try and attend. Ann, would you be able to do the blog next time please? Regards, VPPR.

Summary of meeting held Friday 25 October 2013 Ianon was Toastmaster, again kicking off late because of late arrivals. She made a few small changes to the agenda, including substituting word of the day with a Tonic by Keiko. The Tonic was “everybody is lucky”, a way of looking at even bad events with an optimistic viewpoint. Dominic repeated his award winning humorous speech on “driving lesson lessons” – on the joys of teaching a child to drive, breaking the challenge into categories of movement, sound and ethics. Geoff then did the persuasive speech from the competent communicator manual, setting out to persuade the audience that climate change is good. Ann looked in shock at this heretical proposition. Geoff was not game to survey the audience to find if he successfully argued the case. This speech used some visual cues, and made reference to a current media issue – bush fire hazard, and personal experiences of Meryl. Sandy followed with a speech on Pandora’s Box – a discussion of early childhood trauma. This was a very interesting overview of the psychological impacts of early childhood trauma. This speech made effective use of the whiteboard and a prop – Pandora’s Box, with a symbol of hope. Time allowed only a short Table Topics session, with speeches from four of the ten people present. Both guests, Meryl and Mark, participated. Leona was the TT master, using picture cards as the topics. The first, given by Ianon, was on a basket of shells. Ianon spoke of her visit to a beach upon her arrival in Austrarlia, and how there does not seem to be as many shells on the beach these days. Ann spoke of her plans for Christmas, and pointed out how Christmas is not a time of celebration for everyone in Australia. Meryl spoke on what she packs in her suitcase – too much in short! And Mark finished with a talk on cars – which turned out to be a natural topic for him. Evaluations were constructive, with Leona giving the general evaluation. Meryl gave a rather creative um/ah report, declaring Geoff to the winner, with a count of 9 or 10. This is somewhat worse than Geoff’s recent efforts, but a solid improvement on his first speech, which was around 50!

Synopsis of the Benjamin Toastmasters meeting held Friday 11 October, 2013. The meeting got off to a late start due to late arrivals of members. As the agenda was particularly tight this week this meant the excellant Toastmaster, Geoff, had to run the meeting extremely tightly. Sarina was busy, firstly introducing word of the day 'slugabed", then doing the icebreaker, and also doing the um/ah count. Slugabed is a real word, at least according to the google search. Many speakers did get to use it, albeit pronouncing it "slugabug". The icebreaker was very well presented, and we certainly got to know more of Sarina. Ann was the first speaker up, doing a press conference project from the advanced communication manual.The topic was soil carbon management, but from a soil condition, rather than climate change perspective. The talk elicited some interesting questions, which needed to be guillotined to allow the meeting to finish on time. Following Serina's icebreaer SAndy ran an interesting Table Topics. Unfortunaltey not all members could participated due to the time constraint. Topics were: Views on zoos; One good reason for being late; Why is it good to be a slugabed; and Why Sunday os the best day.The evaluators gave good, useful feedback, with the general evaluator, oor (prospective?) mentor Linda reminding evaluators to have regard to speech objectives when evaluating speeches. Dont forget the Humorous Speech Competition this coming Saturday. Geoff;)

Report following meet of Benjamin Toastmasters on Fri 27 September 2013

The last meeting was an enthusiatic meeting, beginning with a Tonic by Keiko. The second speaker was Peter H., addressing the development of the Canberra water supply system, a topic I greatly enjouyed. Table Topics delivered by Carmen were fantastic: Which is more important? Intelligience or common sense? If you could choose one item of fashion from the past, what would it be? Plus other interesting topics. We had a number of visitors this meeting, including both visitors coming through personal contacts, and visitors responding to our on-line presnces. Please excuse spelling errors - I cannot see what I have written :( The web site is funny tonight.

Meeting update: Friday 13 Sept 2013 Benjamin Toastmasters held a lively meeting Friday 13 September at UC. Sandy did her "Icebreaker" - a lively discussion of her personal history, and therefore how she got to be who she is. Carmen gave a wonderfull speech describing the resources one may utilise when considering or planning to establish a new business. Leona gave an excellent, informative general evaluation. As a final note dues are now due, so we expect to receive emails about this. Regards, Geoff

Summary of meeting of 30 August, and reminder of judging workshop to be held Sat 14th September

We had low attendance at the meeting held 30 August, but nevertheless had some interesting, engaging talks. Keiko ran the meeting as Toastmaster,needing to quickly adapt the agenda due to the low attendance. Tabletopics Master was Leona, who drew the topics randomly from a stack of cards. This generated some interesting, lively, short talks. Dominic did another exercise from the CC manual, this time "get to the point". The talk was on one aspect of the GFC, and had a surprise conclusion. Keiko used the time freed up by the low attendance to practice gving a six minute talk. This was quite a moving talk. It was interesting that two of todays speakers independantly referred to the indirect effects of the second world war on their lives. I haven't heard this theme in Toastmasters before. Next meeting Friday Sept 13. Don't forget the free judging training from 1-4 PM Saturday 14 September. Registration is required.

August Report from Benjamin Toastmasters (BTM)

Benjamin TM had a combined Humorous Speech Contenst and Table Topics Competition on 2nd of August 2013. Dominic took first prize (again I think), with his tale of teaching our younger ones to drive, with references to his own experiences as a learner. This was, I am sure, an interesting topic for most people, as we have mostly been taught to drive, or taught others to drive, or both. New member Sandy blitzed the Table Topics competion field, explaining why she thought it worthwhile having breakfast. Our following meeting (16 August) was quite dynamic, with three fellow Toastmaster visitors, one interested guest, and a regular member Keiko returning after an absence. The visitors (Jenny and Jim, who we have met before, and Linda, who I think is a new vistor) participated actively, adding a new dynamic to the meeting. Keiko offered some suggestions for making the new meeting place easier to find, which we will follow up. Our next meeting is 30 August 2013. If you would like to have directions and/or a map to our meeting location please email geoff.adams@ewater.com.au

Last Benjamin TM meeting before club speech competition

Last Friday saw the last BenjaminToastmasters meeting before the club competion, to be held Friday August 2 in Building 15 at UC.  The two competions will be Table Topics and the Humorous Speech Contest.

Friday's meeting saw a full agenda with two speakers and a new guest - Iwona.  The new club mission was presented, then the word of the day, "changeable", introduced.  The first speech was from Carmen, introduced by Leona.  Carmen spoke from the CC manual, giving a very persuasive argument that applying for jobs requires applying self-marketing skills.  The next speech was from an advanced communication manual - 'Communicating on Television', and involved Ann playing the role as host of a TV interview program.  She was assisted by Geoff who played the role of interviewee.  Ann asked Geoff a number of non-rehearsed questions on the chosen topic - Road Safety, which Geoff then answered for the benefit of the audience.  While Ann was the only participant assessed in this speech, Geoff also found it to be a useful exercise.

Ann was the Table Topics master, providing a broad range of topics.  The guest Iwona rose to the challenge, speaking on whether children should be allowed to play in the rain.  Other topics were:  Should children be told off for using laptops on public transport; are there too many roadworks in Canberra, should smoking be allowed in mental helath institutions, is it OK to burn trees; and is it OK to be forced to change offices at work.

A new member to begin the club’s new year

Today we welcomed Sandy into the club. Sandy has visited three meetings and decided she can improve her speaking skills by joining us – even though she already speaks well. Terrific!

Also, today, Geoff brought Ashis as a visitor to the meeting. Ashis also is already a confident speaker, and he appeared to enjoy the opportunity to answer a Table Topics question and join in generally.

Leona gave us ‘Don’t Panic’ as the Word(s) of the Day, and set us all laughing with her few-word précis of the book ‘Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy’ in which that is apparently a recurring phrase.

‘Don’t panic’ was a very appropriate choice for today’s meeting because the agenda was sent a bit cockeyed by two members having to be absent unexpectedly, so there was no first speech. Several of us found opportunities to include ‘Don’t panic’ in our Table Topics answers or in speaking while filling our roles for the meeting.

Sandy creatively gave us a sequence of Table Topics leading from one to the next, which amply filled in the missing time. She challenged us to reveal our thoughts on such topics as: ‘White lies – good or bad?’, ‘Do we have too many public holidays?’, ‘The most enjoyable feasting meal you have had’, ‘Some useful energy-saving tips’, ‘What makes your holidays enjoyable?’, ‘Tell us your image of the future’, ‘How do you picture Utopia?’ and ‘Give us a thoroughly good news bulletin’.

Everyone responded with interesting and sometimes amusing tales, and everyone fitted their answer within a 2-minute timeslot. This is important practice for Table Topics contests, where you are disqualified if your answer is too short (less than 1 minute) or too long (more than 2.5 minutes).

And some of the tales? Dominic related how his mother in Northern  Ireland, living alone, and having frugal habits that included boiling her breakfast egg in a soup tin to save water and power, would produce wonderfully enjoyable feasts for an influx of eight family adults at Christmas, where the turkey would often be too big for the oven!
Ashis outlined a range of things he enjoys about holidays, depending on how much time is available. A key feature seemed to be absence of all e-devices! Is that possible these days?
Geoff told us the future holds 2000 years of dark ages, after humans have used up all the Earth’s resources, but he gave us hope for the time beyond that when humans would gradually flourish once again.
Leona came out strongly against white lies.
Ianon thinks Australia has enough public holidays, and told us that Malaysia has even more! In a second Table Topic, Ianon later described a Utopia where everyone respects everyone else’s views and property, and there is peace. :-)

Speech 2 this week was from a manual leading towards an Advanced Bronze award. The manual is called ‘Communicating on Television’. For today, Ann and Dominic simulated a 7-minute chat show. Dominic introduced Ann as ‘Robin Hood, who speaks for more trees’. You can guess the topic of Ann’s chat. Dominic, as interviewer, questioned her on optimum tree size in Canberra’s increasingly dense housing areas, and asked why grow more trees when we can’t burn wood? In his evaluation, Geoff said he thought Ann would have been convincing in a real chat show. However, I think she would definitely ‘panic’ in a real studio without the friendly club members as ‘studio audience’!

The meeting finished on time, with all business completed. Next meeting is on 19 July. 

Benjamin Toastmasters club @ UC, 21 June 2013

The club has a new meeting room, at Building 15, near to Ginninderra Drive (see map at the end of this post and in the Meetings page at right), and will meet here till December, at least, and during 2014 as well if possible.

We are very pleased to have had a second visit from guest Sandy, at this meeting. Sandy happily mastered the timing device, as well as taking part in Table Topics. We do hope she will join.

At this, the last meeting for 2012–13, seven members were present: Leona (President), Ianon (VPE), Geoff (VPPR), Peter H (Treasurer and VPM ), Dominic (Sergeant at Arms), Carmen and Ann. Poignantly, it was (member) Yuyu’s last day in Canberra before moving north with her family. She phoned in and we were able to say a brief, remote, goodbye to her and to wish her well. Yuyu joined the club in 2010 and since then she has given 10 speeches, of increasing excellence, gaining her the award ‘Competent Communicator’ and the right to put ‘CC’ after her name.

At today’s meeting, Geoff’s speech gave a thought-provoking rundown on the fluids one needs to keep an eye on, in one’s car. Most of us would only have thought to be checking the radiator fluid or coolant, and the oil level and, perhaps, that the battery cells were wet. In fact, most of us don’t check those nowadays in modern cars. Geoff, alarmingly, pointed out that there are 8 fluids at least one needs to be watching in a car, even a modern one. He outlined where to find these fluids (mostly under the bonnet). We now know we should also be feeling the tyres, gently, as if they were horses’ fetlocks, to check on the pattern of wear on the outside edges. This is all quite apart from the chore of keeping a car clean and shiny (for fuel economy). It was an enlightening speech with no jargon and plenty of quiet authority, and no ‘ums’ or ‘ahs’.

Next, Leona’s speech outlined for us the structure and higher echelons of the Toastmasters organisation in Australia. Beyond clubs there is ‘Area’, which is a name for a group of clubs in the same part of town or country. Benjamin@UC is in Area 17, Belconnen. Sets of adjacent Areas are grouped into a ‘Division’, which represents all the clubs in a region. We are in Monaro Division, obviously in the Monaro part of NSW. Divisions together form a District. There are 10 Divisions in our District 70 (which covers much of NSW including ACT), and there are four Districts for Australia and NZ. Each level of Toastmasters has volunteer officers to represent it. Clubs have executive committees; Area has an Area Governor; Division has a Division Governor; District has a whole team of people. There is so much to know about how Toastmasters operates as an organisation, and it will take another speech to finish the story.

Carmen then proposed some very curly and challenging Table Topics for us, e.g.: ‘If you were trying to persuade an overseas student to study in Canberra, what would you say?’; ‘Tell us how you would manage if you arrived late at the airport, just in time for your plane, and found you had forgotten your ticket’; ‘What do you think is the worst place in Australia? Now tell us what would be good about living there!’; and more in that vein. These were great fun to tackle, and good practice for the Table Topics club contest that is coming up in August.

The evaluations of speeches, Table Topics and the meeting as a whole, produced both approval and points for improvement, as is usual.

Finally, the committee of 2012-13 metaphorically handed over the reins of the club to the new committee for 2013-14. 

If I could propose a ‘toast’ it would be: ‘Here’s to another excellent year coming up!’

*Benjamin has continued to meet fortnightly between June 2012 and June 2013, but without blogs.