More notes from TLI, Jan. 19, 2008

Deron and I (Janet) presented a workshop at Saturday's TLI held at Johnson and Whales culinary school campus near Stapleton. I'll give you my handout at the next meeting.

I felt like we should have given a food demo, but we didn't. I saw our fearless president Eric Peterson there as well as PR VP Dave Truzpek and membership VP Nick Samoylov. I would estimate that several hundered TMs were in attendance despite the snowy holiday weekend.

At the plenary session, a guest TM honcho stressed "friends never let friends give non-manual speeches." In other words, everyone is required to give manual speeches at Toastmasters meetings. That should be easy to do given the wide variety of speech manuals available to those who have completed their first 10 speeches.

TM merchandise like manuals, books, ribbons, etc., was available for sale. I found an interesting advanced manual that I plan to tackle. I have to involve fellow TMs, and you may be one of them!

I highly recommend TLI, especially for officers' training. But any member can gain new insights about running meetings, recruiting and retaining members and speaking eloquently.

Notes from TLI

Competent Leader Program Termination:June 30th, 2008 is the deadline for "grandfathered" Toastmasters who are working under the old Competent Leader program. Member's who have not completed the Competent Leader under the old program will have to complete the new program to obtain the Competent Leader.

Advanced Leader Bronze Members who have their Competent Leader are considered to be equivalent to having obtained the new designation of Advanced Leader Bronze, and may begin working on the Advanced Leader Silver Award.

Assigned Roles This is a hotly debated topic in the VP of Education class. Some clubs do it, others don't, the ones who do it like it, because it increases efficiency. Others say it drives members away. Triskelion's have talked about this from time to time, and will continue to. Feedback on this subject is requested.

Meeting Notes - January 17

Nick Samoylov commanded today's meeting as Toastmaster. January 17th is the birth date of Benjamin Franklin, and he served as the theme for today's meeting. Nick filled the dead air with interesting facts about Ben, and even brought in an omnibus containing all of Mr. Franklin's Almanac's for members and guests to peruse.

A little known event, that was omitted, is that Ben liked to wear a towel on his head, as seen in the picture to the left. No one knows why. It is suspected that Ben, a constant experimenter, had an accident with a new hair dye he had been developing utilizing some left over ink from the presses. Always ready to announce his successes, but contumacious about his failures, Ben chose to wear a towel without explanation. When asked about it, he'd respond contemptuously, "Well, what are you hiding under that wig buster?"

Mike Angel did the heavy lifting today providing our one prepared speech. With this speech Mike completed his first Advanced Manual, the Interpretive Reading Manual. The assignment was to present a famous speech. Mike presented Patrick Henry's, "Give Me Liberty, or Give Me Death, a speech that Patrick Henry delivered to Virginia's House of Burgesses. It was a pleasure hearing the speech in it's entirety. The catchphrase is no shibboleth, but the culmination of a well reasoned and well argued position. Mike did a very good job presenting the speech stepping outside of his soft spoken style to project the force and passion of the words.

Eric Peterson was our Table Topics master, and in the spirit of Ben's birthday provided us with questions based on facts about Ben Franklin.

As General Evaluator I, Deron White, did my summing up. Nick did an excellent job running the meeting. My main critique is that we have fallen into the habit of running past 12:45. As a lunch club of professionals this is critical: starting on time is human; finishing on time is divine.

Next week:

We will be treated to a speech by Dave Trzupek with Janet Reese evaluating. Mike Angel has stepped forward to ply us with Table Topics. Deron White will be Toastmaster. That leave the following roles to be filled:

• General Evaluator
• Speaker #2
  
• Word of the Day - or even Joke of the Day
• Ah-Dinger (counter)
  
• Grammarian
• Timer

Please e-mail me as Toastmaster if you wish to fulfill a role.

First Impressions

Last weeks theme was on impressions, the kind you do, not the kind that you give. I miss understood this and instead focused the table topics on impressions, the ones you give.

Here's a video about First Impressions that Triskelion's might enjoy.

January 10, 2008 Impressions/Caricatures

Elvis left the building before he arrived and actor-turned California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (aka Dan Pratt) filled in as today's Toastmaster. Hilarious! best describes today's caricature theme antics pulled off skillfully by "Arnold." Our two guests, Seth and his coworker friend, might have been surprised by our laughter-exploding meeting. We hope they return.

Mike Angel, our first and only speaker, voice-acted a play in his well-executed interpretive reading. Karen Lang evaluated Mike's performance, taking into account Mike's unique objectives.

In table topics, each of us answered Deron White's "personal impression" related questions with special in-character voice inflections and accents. Eric took TT prize with his Andy Rooney and weather guy--yes, 2 turns--caricatures. The other's were well-done, too. There was Napoleon (Nick), Aunt Bee from Mayberry (Karen), and some good southern accents mixed in between. Some folks acted like themselves. Imagine that! We applaud our guest Seth for stepping up to give us his wonderful impressions.

General Evaluator Oprah--do you believe it??? Yes, Oprah--aka Janet Reese provided useful tips like not interrupting during a meeting and setting up beforehand.

Everyone roared with laughter, a sign that the meeting was one of our best. Thanks to Arnold (Dan) for setting the stage for a creative and funny meeting. Just goes to show you, there's a comedian in all of us.

Thanks to John for providing a bell to "ding" the ahs right out of our speech.

Now we're looking for a toastmaster for next week's meeting. If you haven't been to a meeting lately or served as TM, here's your opportunity. As a reminder, the TM ensures that all the roles are filled for his or her meeting. Volunteer for a role -- complete the program and practice your speaking skills!

See you next week, Jan. 17!

Highlights From Our Phenomenal Thursday January 3rd 2008 Meeting

By Eric Peterson, President, Triskelion Toastmasters Club # 4853, Centennial Colorado

 

Toastmaster Mike Angell rang in our first meeting of 2008 by wishing one an all best wishes for the new year and looked forward to another year of fun, energetic and enthusiastic meetings.

 

Word of the Day was by Cary Bradley – “Arcanum” which is a secret or mysterious knowledge not normally available to the average person.

 

Members used the word of the day in their table topics which were conducted by Nick Samoylov.

 

First speaker of the day was Dave Trzupek who used a flip chart to discuss various methods a company can use to generate business. Dave was evaluated by Janet Reese.

 

Second speaker of the day was Deron White who told of his teenage misadventures on a family car trip to a restaurant along the Hudson River in upstate New York. Deron was evaluated by Dan Pratt.

 

Nick Samoylov led us in table topics and back in time to Leonardo DaVinci’s lifetime and then forward to speculate about the future.

 

General Evaluator was Eric Peterson.

 

Timer was Cindy Castilow.

 

Grammarian and Ah Counter was Cary Bradley.

 

03 Jan 2008/ep