The theme of ‘New Beginnings’, our first meeting of 2022 started slightly late due to some technical issues with our online members.

 However Amy, as Sergeant At Arms, got the meeting started, then took over as Timer.

James wass our Toastmaster of the evening, making our four guests feel welcome by weaving the story of his first visit into informing them of what an impressive organisation Toastmasters International is.

Tim introduced himself as the Grammarian and ‘blossom’ as the word of the day.

James led the warmup where we were all encouraged to share what we wanted to achieve in 2022 and eight words or less (I didn’t hit that target!).  This exercise got us all looking forward and upped our energy levels.

We had four prepared speeches to enjoy. Both Michelle and Emil gave very different opinions to mentoring.

Gulbegim spoke from Uzbekistan about the parallels she drew between hiking and starting a business.

Sher gave his Icebreaker Speech and was thrilled to win Best Speaker of the evening.

Evaluations were given by Bence, feeding back to Michelle.  He managed to get the ‘blossom’ into both the introduction and evaluation an impressive number of times.

Santosh evaluated Emil and Nishanth, dialling in from India, gave Gulbegim some structured pointers.

Table Topic

I was also the Table Topic Master of the evening with questions relating to new year and  new beginnings.

Sanat told us about his new year’s resolutions.  Matthew started his evaluation by professing that he had not listened to the speech.  It was obvious by his detailed feedback that he had heard enough!

Two of our guests stepped right out of their comfort zones, and agreed to participate. Both did amazingly well,  

Saab won the best table topic as she explained what she was most proud of in 2021.  She was evaluated by Tim who also won the best TT Evaluator. 

Danny began a little nervously, but really got into flow and talked for more than two minutes about what he wanted to see more of in 2002.  His speech was evaluated by Emil.

Awards

Best Speaker – Sher with his Ice-breaker

Best Evaluator – Gina, evaluating Sher

Best Table Topic – Saab (Guest)

Best TT Evaluator – Tim

President’s Award – James

Club Business

Club Officer training – 29th of January – This is for anyone who wants to learn more about Toastmasters (you don’t have to be an officer).  It is also a great networking opportunity, meeting people from other clubs in the area.  Contact Nishanth or Santhosh for more information.

Godiva Club International Speech and Evaluation Contest will take place on 8th March – anyone would like to take part, it is a fantastic opportunity to up-level and gain valuable experience.

Godiva Accelerated Learning group is another fantastic opportunity which will support anybody wanting to improve their Evaluation and Table Topic (impromptu speaking) skills.  A commitment of about 30 minutes a week is required in order to accelerate these important skills.