Table Topics: a fortnightly chance to exercise imagination!

Lili organised the Table Topics at our 16 May meeting, last week. She took a highly original approach which worked successfully, allowing for plenty of imagination, humour and good feelings. Lili asked us all to write a secret on a slip of paper. Then she collected the papers up into a box and passed them back out to us, making sure we didn’t get our own.

‘I nearly drowned when I was young!’, was one secret. ‘I always wanted to be a pilot!’ was another. And what about ‘I found a gold nugget!’? There were 8 of our (now 12) members at the meeting, and almost all the secrets were equally intriguing.

To respond to these topics, the speaker first had to guess which of us had written the secret, and explain the reason for the guess, and then to elaborate on their own secret (after it had been spoken about). The guessing and reasoning were very humorous, and often quite stilted. In contrast, as soon as speakers began to explain their own secrets they became fluent and passionate. What a great way to run Table Topics, giving us all a really different experience from normal. Congratulations Lili.

Our President, Ianon, also welcomed Lili as one of our new members, with a short speech.

The rest of the meeting followed a more usual course. Peter offered 'Leadership’ as our Word of the Day. Then Ann had a go at presenting an organised speech (project 2 in the Competent Communicator manual) about ‘Running a display’. She suggested three objectives: (i) know what outcome you aim to achieve via the display (e.g. greater awareness of the organisation?, or more people registering for an upcoming event?, or…); (ii) present a simple clear message that will achieve that outcome; (iii) aim for minimum effort (e.g. only a few small handouts, and a banner fronted by a knowledgeable rep., rather than piles of books, things for sale, etc.). Having just three main points helped Ann to keep the speech organised!

Next meeting, 30 May. 

Yet another icebreaker! 2 May 2014

We had one of our usual well-attended and exemplary meetings on 2 May, with only one member absent. We welcomed guest Baran, who has also visited the club previously. Nicole gave her first speech, her ‘icebreaker’, which was well prepared and told us about her life in Australia so far. She has lived in several cities and found them all different. She appeared remarkably relaxed, speaking without notes for most of the time!  Dominic’s evaluation was very positive, including one recommendation. Karina then offered a set of challenging Table Topics, which gave impromptu speaking opportunities to everyone who was not otherwise speaking at the meeting. Topics included: Your favourite animal?, Do you like uncertainty?, Is formal education better than informal?  Geoff gave the table topics evaluation, including an evaluation of his own topic.   

The meeting on May 2 included election of the club’s office bearers for 2014-15 and the distribution of the annual-general-meeting reports for 2013-14. Linda, our new member who is also currently President of the ANU’s ‘University Club’, conducted the election. There being no competing nominations, no voting was required. The new officers will be listed on the club details page nearer their start date of 1 July.

Next meeting is on Friday 16 May. 

Meeting of Wed 16 April 2014 - two icebreakers!

This fortnight's meet was held on Wednesday due to the Good Friday public holiday.  It started a little late as some members had trouble finding the different room. Geoff played dual roles of SAA and Toastmaster, and also rescued some members who couldn't find the room.  Lucky we had mobile phones!
Karina gave the first icebreaker, titled Life, Love & Learning.  It was an interesting philosophical take on her life, and certainly let us get to know her better.  She had a lot to say and went well over time.  Lili gave the next icebreaker, explaining how she accidentally became a hydrologist.  This gave us an interesting insight into another culture.
Nicole gave three interesting table topics:
  - Karina was asked to assess whether a private tutor is a stable job, giving a well reasoned response.
  - Ianon was asked about her favourite colour, and what feelings or moods it causes her.  This was a very apt question for Ianon, and she described the feelings associated with a number of colours.
  - Peter H was asked if interpersonal relationships are very important, and how do you establish them.  He argued that such relationships are important, and described ways of establishing a variety of relationship types.

Peter then gave the general evaluation, usefully educating the new members about the commend, recommend, commend approach to evaluating speeches.
Overall it was a fun meeting.

Blog for Meeting of Friday 4 April 2014

But first, a reminder that the next meeting is planned for Wednesday 16 April, in room 2C7, due to the Good Friday holiday.
The meeting got off to a mixed start due to unplanned absence of the Sergeant at Arms, who was injured in an accident.  His colleague, who brought the box of "stuff", inadvertently left the timer, name tags, gavel etc behind, which had been removed from the box.  Nevertheless, the meeting went ahead as planned.  Overall we had 10 members and visitors present.  With 10 current members we meet the TI requirement for club membership. Unfortunately we have lost experienced member Leona, who is directing her energies to another club. Nevertheless we still have a number of experienced members, which is great for training new members.
The first speaker was absent.  Keiko gave a very moving advanced manual talk about Atomic Bomb victim Sadako and the 1000 paper cranes.  Very poignant for me, as I took my family to the Hiroshima peace park and museum last holidays, where we saw many tales of bomb victims, and the statue of Sadako.  With no first speaker, new member Nicole was able to run a longer Table Topics session.   Again we had some fantastic topics - I wish I could come up with such thought provoking topics.  Peter H. was asked what he thought about fashion.  Visitor Baran was asked whether experience was more important than knowledge, given that many University graduates cannot find jobs.  Lili was asked which country she would most like to visit, and why.  (An easy question for her, as she hasn't been home for three years.)  Geoff was given the scenario that  he had a contract with God giving him superhuman powers, but that if used them to assist find Malaysian Airline flight 370 he would lose the powers.  He was asked if would he use the powers to assist find the missing flight.  He argued that he would not use the powers to assist find the missing flight.  Linda was asked what she would do about scarce resources.  Keiko then directed a topic at Nicole - "I am interviewing you for a job.  Tell me why I should hire you".
It is great to see that the new members are already showing improvement.  Indeed feedback to me is that I have shown great improvement over the last 18 months.

Benjamin Toastmasters meeting of 21 March 2014 at University of Canberra

This meeting was again a small ome - nine present, including three visitors.
Geoff stepped up to act as Toastmaster.  Leona replaced the no-show first speaker with a great introduction to speaker roles - targeted to visitors and new members, but also illuminating for me.
Ianon gave an informative speech on High Performance Leadership - based on the six dimensions of leadership:
 - Vision and values
 - Direction
 - Persuasion
 - Support
 - Development
 - Appreciation
Ianon focussed on the last two dimensions.

Dom was Table Topics Master.  He provided four thought provoking topics.  Peter addressed the question as to whether too much is spent on sport, and if sport has lost its connection with the community.  Karina spoke to 'if you could sing, who would you be?' - an easy one for her since she turned out to be a singer.
Lili addressed accent/communication issues, and Nicole spoke about what she might like to change (or not change) about her childhood.
The speech evaluations from both Peter and Karina were great, and great models for future evaluators.

All in all another fun meet.  :)

Benjamin Club hosted the Belconnen area speaking contest, 15 March

As you know, from the post two-below about our internal club 'International speech' contest, Toastmasters clubs hold competitions to find their best speakers.

The six clubs in the Belconnen area, ACT, competed on Saturday 15 March at University of Canberra's Retro Cafe to find the best speakers to represent our 'area' in 'International speech', and also in 'Evaluation' - two separate competitions.
Our club, Benjamin, was the host, making all the arrangements (thanks to our capable and very experienced President, Ianon). Judges for these contests are invited from across the district to ensure impartiality; all the competing clubs also contribute volunteers to fill the various other leadership roles laid down in the formal guidelines for running Toastmasters contests.

The International speeches tackle topics that are inspirational or thought provoking. The audience of about 40 at Retro Cafe heard a smorgasbord of very good speeches, each lasting between 5 and 7 minutes. There was: how public speaking helps a person frame how they address controversial topics even within the family (Dominic); everyone is capable of good and bad or unexpected behaviour (Tami); the inspiration of a mother overcoming enormous challenges to raise five sons (Tony); awkward colleagues can be found in all types of workplaces (Mike); how little we really know about coffee and its background until we research the fine print (Chris); and some life-changing experiences in Cairo (Angela).

After a tea break, we heard from 'target' speaker Sangeeta, whose speech was then evaluated by the six contestants in the Evaluation contest. Sangeeta benevolently discussed features we have all noticed in the various generations we belong to. In particular, we heard how Gen Y differs from older gens, and there were a good many 'ah-ha' moments! Each contestant made notes during the speech. Then they were ushered to another room, given a few minutes to refine their thinking and notes, and brought back one by one to speak their unique 2-3 minute evaluations.  

The afternoon concluded with announcements of the winners of the two contests (in both, Dept-of-Immigration Club = First; Kippax Club = Second), presentation of certificates and the winners' trophies (personal and perpetual), and the drawing of the contest raffle.

Benjamin Club is very grateful to UC's Coop Books and also to UC's Mizzuna Cafe, which between them generously donated four of the much-desired raffle prizes.

*The ultimate winner of the various levels of the contest (club - area - district - division) will represent NSW and ACT at the even-higher-level contests overseas for the ultimate title of World Champion, later this year. (That's why it's called 'international'.)

Meeting no. 1017 - 7 March 2014

This meeting began in a rather dishevelled manner, as the two scheduled speakers were unable to speak, and we had five visitors. Nevertheless, the meeting was quickly turned into a fun, productive meeting. In place of speeches Leona (I hope my recollection is correct about the organiser of this) arranged a round-robin talk. This was surpisingly fun. Our new member Karina was Table Topics Master, and came up with some great topics, including some on-the-fly to fill in time because of the missing scheduled speakers. Karina's topics were: 1.Learning from our elders helps avoid making mistakes in our lives. Give an example of advice given to you by your parents that turned out to be wrong, or a mistake they made that helped you learn to avoid making the same mistake. 2. They say that the problem with elections is that whoever you vote for, you get a politician. Can you think of an alternative? 3. What is your ideal getaway and how do you deal with day to day stress? Any stress-busting tips? 4.Some compare having a pet with having a child. In what way is this true or not true? 5.Once the National gallery displayed 3 black paintings as modern art. What is the purpose of modern art? Does it make the world a better place? 6.What does home mean to you? 7.Competition. Is it healthy? Keiko's table topics evaluations were as usual informative, incisive, and a valuable model for us to use in the future. Thankyou. Overall, I was pleased that we had a productive meeting, despite the unexpected problems at the start. VPPR.