FS Toastmasters

We had a slightly different look to the meeting today. The theme was “Change is in the Air”. Stan Coss, Toastmaster, took us on a lively trip exploring a new format suggested to shake up things a bit. The purpose being to see if we can get more table topics into the meeting line-up. He did accomplish that.  We skipped the Pledge of Allegiance and went straight from Sergeant at Arms calling the meeting to order to Toastmaster taking charge. The agenda is an important tool in this format as it has the responsibilities of each member of the Eyes and Ears Team printed in a side-bar. Don Groff, Word Master and Grammarian did respond to a prompt from Stan to give us the word of the day. Don Glovan and Hoyt, Timer and Ah-counter respectively were given one prompt for only one to respond to. The prompt had to do with the protest gesture of taking a knee at sporting events. Don Glovan responded, reluctantly. Our speaker was Ron Climer with a persuasive speech entitled, “You...

“What’s Up?”, the theme for our first meeting of the 2018 year, featured several new possibilities for doing things at our meetings.  The room was set in a semi circle arrangement partly because the tables were still standing in the room and partly because we have had a  recommendation to change the room seating to make it more intimate. Did it work? Ivan Beggs presented a memorable speech on “Impromptu Speaking” from the Better Speaker Series. As a DTM, Ivan is using this speech to complete a second Advanced Communicator Silver Award. He said he chose impromptu speaking because we use this skill daily. He gave us strategies for approaching an impromptu opportunity and a simple process to be effective win delivering the message. Most important he said is to be brief, confident, and sincere. In her evaluation, Jackie Branscum said she couldn’t find any meaningful “grows” to improve Ivan’s speech. The audience had a couple of minor thoughts. Don Groff the second speaker...

Some Toastmasters had to go to work or other engagements, but after the regular meeting at LPL, these Toastmasters carried on the last TM fun and fellowship of 2017 at Starbucks. Jackie and Sally took charge at LPL and planned an unusual, fun meeting. We only had a timer, Don Groff, a speaker, Judy, and the rest was fun in a Group Story and in Table Topics. Judy did a poem for Project 2 in the advance manual, Interpretive Reading. She read the classic poem, "The Night Before Christmas" which set the stage for the rest of the meeting.  For the group story, Jackie just gave the first prompt, which was “Twas the night before Christmas and ….."  Ron picked up the story leaving us in a Catholic Church for a Christmas Eve service, followed by Betty, Hoyt, Don Groff, Sally, Don Gloven, Ivan, Jim, Melinda, and ended by Judy. Everyone contributed to this story which convoluted into multiple situations about a box of various sizes with lots of presents hidden inside...

(The officer meeting followed the regular meeting; the regular meeting had a Christmas theme and the board meeting had the theme of building membership.  Some ideas from the officer meeting resonated from ideas presented two weeks prior at the officer training.  VP of Membership Betty McCallister, R, and VP of Education Sally Jones, L, show eagerness to learn.) After some role clarification, we had a fun and entertaining meeting. Carol served as Toastmaster, Brad was Grammarian, Hoyt as Wordmaster, Gon Gloven as Ah Counter, Jackie as Timer (and Ron read off the good and naughty list as GE) . Don Groff told a great joke about a parrot that used lots of swear words.  Stan Coss was our only speaker, but he was enough. He captured our full attention and kept it during his Interpretive reading titled the “Drowning Man”. This was a play with three characters by Anton Chekov and adapted to by Neil Simon. Judy’s evaluation spoke highly of Stan’s technique in diffe...

Anyone who missed today’s meeting really missed a treat. President Carol Walters hosted a delicious brunch after the meeting set up in the Lake Point Landing Dining Room which was all decorated for the season.  During the meeting we had a guest speaker and a Mentoring Moment by Jackie Branscum.  Sally Jones was Toastmaster. After the opening and joke by Hoyt Griffith and introduction of the eyes and ears team of Burton Hodges as Grammarian, Judy Groff as Word Master, Ron Climer as Ah Counter and Ivan Beggs as Timer. Sally introduced our guest speaker, Meredith Summey. Meredith is a student at Western Carolina University finishing her course in public speaking. This was her third time doing her speech to a Toastmaster club.  This speech persuaded us to accept pets as friends and medical experts in relieving stress, high blood pressure and other bad things. We all enjoyed Meredith’s speech with research backi...

  Brad Dienst was the Toastmaster. He doubled as Joke Master as well. We had two speakers.  Judy Groff did her first project from the Interpretive Reading Advanced Manual. She chose a tale from the classic Don Quixote , written by Cervantes around 1605. Judy read the story of the Dreadful and Unfortunate Wind Mills which is one of the well known comic stories about the medieval knight errant’s adventures in and around La Mancha, Spain. Ron Climer was speaker #2. His speech was from the Speaking to Inform Advanced Manual. He gave us many tips about saving money. He suggested we should save ten percent of what we bring in every month. He also suggested that credit not be used to purchase ‘toys” such as motor cycles and jet skies. As usual, Ron had many applicable and humorous stories to enhance his speech.  Jackie Branscum and Carol Walters both had excellent grows and glows for Judy and Ron in their eva...

We had a busy fall and received much acclaim for our efforts. The Open House was great because Betty and her team did such a fantastic job of planning it.  (The format was revived easily with another invite on the date of our last meeting.)   We had a Humorous Speech Contest with the Evaluation Contest, chaired by Judy, with Betty as Chief Judge. This was all done in conjunction with our regular meeting. We should be proud and thankful for being involved with this great group of people.      I found a long lost link to  a video of me doing the “Everybody Has Something” speech that I did two years ago for the International Speech Contest. It was on YouTube.   I was pleased with my progress in speaking and with moving around on stage. Perhaps we should try to do more video-recording?  (Stan volunteers to do any recording and posting, too, if that is desired.  Just give ample notice of a day or two.)     ...