25th November 2020 - A Classic Meeting

 

You’ll get a sense of the flavour of our meetings from all of these blogs.  However, if also you’re looking of a more detailed description of what actually happens at a standard Toastmasters meeting, the following is an excellent guide…

President, Martin - Introduction of session, welcome of members and guests, intro to the evening’s…

Toastmaster, Jenny – her first task is to ask people with roles to explain their role:

• Christoffer, Online housekeeper: rules of online session - some tips
1. Check if everything working, tech, join early, turn on camera, get rid of distractions
2. During meeting, keep microphone on mute when not speaking, give speakers your full attention, applause silently show appreciation, raise hand if want to add on for topics session, short break between, turn camera off when you're gone
3. Last part for speakers - try to focus on camera, when speaking make sure you keep note of timekeeping
4. Remember we are here to have fun!
• Grammarian, Christine – keeping note of creative uses of language and word of the day: the work "agog" - express very interest / wide open / full of wonder or surprise / full of life or activity – will report findings at end.
• Ah-counter, Eugene – note any overused words or filler sounds used by people during the meeting -umm, ahh, etc.
• Time keeper, Maire – monitor time during speeches, table topics and evaluations, has the green background, yellow and red to notify speakers of time
• Creative corner, AislingC – wrap up meeting in creative way
• Scribe, Maria – this overview of meeting to be uploaded to website after
• General Evaluator AislingN - take overview of meeting and make evaluation at the very end of everything and all that happens and doesn't happen

Topic session - topics master Molly – Facilitate the table topic which allows us to practice impromptu speaking – speakers are given a discussion point and have two minutes to speak.  Others can follow with an add-on of up to one minute.

Molly selected subjects with a Christmas theme:

• May have all received some unwanted gifts in our lives - random things.  The baby Jesus was given golf frankincense and myrrh, do you think he was happy with this gift and what did he do with them?
• The late late toy show on this Friday night - what was your fav childhood toy?
• Black Friday is coming up - trampling on anyone who gets in the way  - if money wasn't an option what would you buy yourself?
• Christmas is time where we relax more and watch more telly - finished queens gambit - tells story of woman who is chess master - which game or sport would you become a master and what would you do?

Prepared Speeches – these are generally 5-7 minutes long, each with an evaluator to provide feedback.

Martin - "Can you hear me now"

Connection issues, digitally connected, often can be misinterpreted etc. Describes communication styles

Pat1 - "Tir gan anaim"

Tir gan anaim, tir gan teanga - country without language is a country without a soul. The importance of the irish language, naming of the estate. The only estate does not have an irish name on the circular road, the other estates are difficult to pronounce for non irish-speakers… names of towns, teaching of Irish, Irish language over the years…protect townland names

Pat2 - "Candy brain"

Sacro-cerebritis, western lifestyle disease - effect caused by refined sugar energy to the brain - consumption of news - can be as damaging as eating a heavy meal = indigestion, slows you down, take you away from doing something useful… gave up news, changed his diet. You can make a full recovery from candy brain.

 

Break for 10 minutes – allowing speakers and evaluators to discuss in breakout rooms and all to have refreshments.

Evaluation Stage

After the break the General evaluator, Aisling takes over for 2nd half of meeting, discusses her role and introduces the evaluators, who have 2-3 minutes each to provide feedback…

1.        Jenny – evaluating Martin’s speech – what he did well, connection with audience, easy to identify self in the different types of communicators, great opening, relatable, interesting way to start, good use of hand gestures - recommendations: pace of the speech, pauses could be brought in, improved as speech went on, also slightly over time, but enjoyed speech, well prepared and delivered and achieved purpose.

2.        Mohammed – evaluating Pat1’s speech – congrats to Pat for completing project, presenting proposal for innovative planning pathway.  Excellent non-verbal communication skills, he stood, able to use hand gestures, his voice was very clear and eye contact excellent, good use of vocal variety, aware of audience of knowledge of topic, speech was well organized, detail of the speech, was very comfortable with knowledge of topic and very interested.  Areas of improvement: using fewer details, focus on proposal to make it clearer.  Overall excellent speech.

3.        Eugene – evaluating Pat2’s speech –related to Pat’s topic and fascinated by switching off the news. Agrees with points made, spot on.  Very good structure, good use of pauses and gestures visible, good facial gestures as well.  Looking at screen for audience reaction.  Try to look more directly at the camera, at least occasionally - challenge yourself to do a speech looking only at the camera.

 

Reports

• Grammarian: total of 8 times using word of the day, listing all people who used it and where; other nice phrases used throughout the evening.
• Ah-counter: reported each person’s use of “ah”s.

 

Creative Corner - AislingC- recited a poem "Let Yourself Rest" by Jeff Foster

 To round off the meeting, our General evaluator, AislingN provided her feedback on the meeting:

• When she started it was about public speaking, but also learned what leadership is all about – an example this evening was when scribe position wasn't filled – Jenny encouraged Maria to taking on the role at the last minute. 
• Starting on time, being punctual - Praise for a man who is not very fond of getting praised in public – Martin.
• Toastmaster, Jenny’s chairing 1st half of meeting, nice greeting, lovely ending, succeeding in reaching all goals, after each speaker she asked the timekeeper for speaker’s time.
• Topicsmaster, Molly - round of applause - greats topics and everyone involved, showed active listening skills as referenced back to previous topics.
• Grammarian, Christine - great word Agog - fun word, easy to remember, everyone could relate to in everyday life, great to introduce in day to day conversations, good to expand our vocabulary.
• Ah Counter very good and taken on board in positive way.
• Times for speeches, went a bit over throughout - evaluators- gave positives, then recommendations, then positives - important to not repeat or summarize speech, more about giving feedback, need to state if the speaker has achieved objective of the speech.

After filling the roles for next meeting’s agenda, the meeting closed on time just before 10pm.

Next meeting - 9th December.