Every July marks the start of the toastmasters’ calendar. In our chapter meeting for July, we have installed in the new club Executive Committee (EXCO) for 2009-10. Special thanks to our Area S3 Governor, Leela Kalwani, for gracing the ceremony and installing the EXCO.
With the installation, the EXCO took up the challenge and pledged to make this club strong, dedicated to helping people from all walks of life to listen with sensitivity, think creatively, and speak in an effective manner.
Let us welcome the EXCO for 2009-2010!
EXCO @ The Serangoon, 2009 - 2010
President: Daryl Neo
VP (Education): Emmanuel Guiang
VP (Membership): Madeline Neo
VP (Public Relations): Isaac Neo
Secretary: R. Udhayakumar
Treasurer: Yap Yee Tharm
Sergeant-At-Arms: Elizabeth Leng
Immediate Past President: Mike Chia
ANNOUNCEMENT OF UPCOMING Events
American writer, William Arthur Ward, once said, “A well-developed sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to your steps as you walk the tightrope of life.” Humor creates laughter and light hearted moods. Humor is a cure to many stresses of modern day life. Come, laugh and be humored at the Humorous Speech Contest.
Mark Twain advised that “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” The Speech Evaluation contest gives an opportunity to hear different views and feedback. Come and learn how to give feedback at the Speech Evaluation Contest.
If you have what it takes, come join the 2 contest. Contest registration now open, till 31 July 2009. Kindly direct your participation requests to theserangoontmc@gmail.com. (Titled your email: I WANT TO JOIN) Contest only open to members of Toastmasters @ The Serangoon.
Contest Dates:
Club: 3rd Sept (Tentative, on demand)
Area S3: Sept 26, At The Serangoon (Tentative)
Divisions: October, At Whampoa CC (Tentative)
Please find the latest edition of our newsletter attached.
Regards,
Editorial Team 2009/2010
Toastmasters @ The Serangoon
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Monday, March 16, 2009
Preparing Ourselves for the Future
The world is in a recession caused by the meltdown of the financial industry. It started from the subprime mortgage crisis only affecting America, slowly building up winds with impenetrable clouds of dust and sand until becoming the perfect hurricane. For the last 6 months, this financial hurricane has caused great damage to our economy, threatening to bring down big names like AIG, Ford and more. It is still in full steam driving ahead, tearing down everything in its path. Reports after reports, companies are downsizing and retrenching staff to keep operations alive, companies are seeking government bailouts and companies needing to file for bankruptcy. There seemed a never ending stream of bad news.
Would the economic situation improve? Definitely it will. It’s only a matter of time.
I want to share with you a fable called The Ant and The Grasshopper?
In a field one summer's day a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to its heart's content. An Ant passed by, bearing along with great toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest.
"Why not come and chat with me," said the Grasshopper, "instead of toiling and moiling in that way?"
"I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the Ant, "and recommend you to do the same."
"Why bother about winter?" said the Grasshopper; we have got plenty of food at present." But the Ant went on its way and continued its toil. When the winter came the Grasshopper had no food and found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants distributing every day corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the summer.
Then the Grasshopper knew: It is best to prepare for the days of necessity.
The moral of this story is to prepare for the days of necessity. Will you be prepared when the economy improves?
Definitely! I have this conviction that Toastmasters prepares us for challenges. Therefore, starting this month, we are instituting changes in our chapter meetings to prepare us to grow as Toastmasters, positioned for the future.
1. Chapter Meetings
a. Feedback Sheet
Giving feedback is one of the skills that we practice in toastmasters. If we are serving as an evaluator, we give feedback to encourage the speaker. Sometimes we shy away from giving feedback because we are not used to doing so. Therefore, in our chapter meeting, we will be distributing feedback sheets. With the different speeches (projects/evaluation speeches), if you want to encourage the speaker, you can fill in this sheet and pass it to the relevant speaker at the end of meeting. We want to create an environment that supports learning through feedback to one another.
b. Guide to “Serving as Appointment Holder and Making Greetings”In order to help us serve better our roles as meeting appointment holders, we have prepared a guide of things to do. This guide will be given to the appointment holders during the chapter meeting, which serves as a handbook to remind us of the demands of the appointment.
Similarly, we have prepared a guide to making introduction. This guide will be placed at the lectern. For anyone coming up to the lectern to speak, we can use the template so as to learn how to greet at a Toastmasters meeting.
c. Target for Project and Serving as Appointment Holder
Goal setting is extremely important to motivating us towards success. Therefore, starting from April, there will be a roadmap worked out for each of you.
What is this roadmap?
This roadmap will be your project presentation schedule, where you book your project presentation slots in advanced. The target that we are setting for each member on the competent communication track to complete a minimum of one project every 2 months. For those on advanced communicator track, to complete at least one project every 3 months.
Serving in different appointment roles at chapter meeting will train us in various aspect of communication. As an AH counter, we practice listening skills, catching all the pause fillers used in speeches. As a timer, we learn the importance of keeping timing in speeches. As an evaluator, we learn the art of motivating people through our feedback. Likewise, to encourage us to learn the different skills through participation, we will work out a chapter meeting appointment schedule with all of you. The target is to have you serve as an appointment holder whenever you are not doing any projects.
2. Mentors
Learning without guidance can be difficult, especially if you are new to toastmasters. How to do your projects, what topic to select, how to say it? Learning cannot be tougher than that. Knowing this, we have Jun Peralta and Randy Sng offering to be mentors. They are both experienced toastmasters, who are willingly to share their experience with us. Therefore, if you are doing your projects and need guidance, you can drop them an email.
Fellow toastmasters, let us embrace these changes and prepare ourselves for the future as motivated toastmasters!
March Club News
We wish to thank Randy for motivating us with his sharing on Sir Edmund Hillary. The club would like especially to thank, President Nathan of Braddell Heights TMC for lending us support as Table Topics Master and Project Evaluator at our meeting. Congratulations to the following members for completing their projects.
- Project 4 - Elizabeth Leng
- Project 6 - Madeline Neo
- Advanced Project 3 - Jun Peralta
Sunday, February 22, 2009
What Can We Do During These Times?
We have the recession, and we asked what the government of this country could do for us.
And so the government has responded in the 2009 budget by giving Singaporeans:
Additional GST credit
Service and Conservancy Charges Rebates
Tax assistance to households
Increase in additional CFP housing grant
Financial assistance for students and a few others….
We have jobs instability, and we asked what our company could do for us.
And so our companies responded by offering the employees to retain our jobs:
Using the Job Credit Scheme and/or
Shorter work week
A pay-cut across the board
We have our Toastmasters club and we asked what the club could do for us.
Our Club provides:
a conducive environment where members meet up once a month to practise public speaking techniques
Mentors to guide you through your Competent Communication manual, which is a series of 10 self-paced speaking assignments designed to instill a basic foundation in public speaking.
a chance to learn leadership skills by taking on various meetings roles and serving as officers at clubs and district levels, and by working in the Competent Leadership manual and the High Performance Leadership program.
a feedback process by asking members to evaluate one another presentations.
Despite all these offers of solutions, we often question if what they have done are enough.
We always feel that the government should do more... our companies should do more and our club should do more too.
More never seems to be enough.
We have the recession, and we asked what the government of this country could do for us.
We have jobs instability, and we asked what our company could do for us.
We have our toastmasters club and we asked what the club could do for us.
You see, there is never an "ENOUGH" in life. Our success in life depends on how we respond to life's challenges. We have a choice. We can decide to continue to passively wait for things to happen, or decide today to be proactively seeking to make a positive difference to our life. It is only by doing so that we can create a positive and bright future together.
Let's us start to ask ourselves, "What can I do better?"
Let's not ask what the club can do for us but what we can do for the club.
And how exactly can we do so? We can by:
Faithfully attend the monthly chapter meeting
Completing our Competent Communicator Manual and/or the advanced manual
Learning leadership skills by taking on various meetings roles and serving as officers at clubs and district levels
Learning from a different perspective by evaluating members.
Let's start to embrace challenges together and contribute!
February Club News
Let us praise a number of our members who achieved significant milestones in our February meeting. Congratulations to Joan for completing her 10th project. Congratulations as well to Dave who did his first project. Congratulations also to Edison who bravely did two projects in one night.
We wish to thank our club members like Mike, Peng and Jun who served as evaluators. We also thank Madeline who served as the toastmaster of the evening. Also the club was honored to have a pioneer member attend the club meeting - Asha.
We wish to thank our club members like Mike, Peng and Jun who served as evaluators. We also thank Madeline who served as the toastmaster of the evening. Also the club was honored to have a pioneer member attend the club meeting - Asha.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Happy Chinese New Year!
We wish everyone a happy and prosperous 2009. The incoming Year of the Ox is generally considered a fruitful year. From our club perspective, this year maybe the best time to work on your projects and grow into a more confident communicator and leader.
So prepare for an exciting year ahead!
Club News for January 2009:
In our last club meeting, one of our new members Emmanuel did his first project and Joan Wong also completed her project 9. Let's congratulate them on a job well done.
We also welcome our newest member Dave Tang who participated in club activities like table topics. Congratulations also to Mike Chia who was voted the best table topics speaker of the evening.
All in all, it was a good start of the year for all.
How to be a Good Conversationalist
Have you ever come to a social event like a party and felt awkward? Do you have problem striking a conversation with complete strangers? Do you have trouble having a conversation with people you don't know?
Many people think that the art of good conversation is to speak in an interesting and arresting fashion, to be noted for your humour, ability to tell stories and your general knowledge of a variety of subjects. Many people feel that, if they want to be better at conversation, they must become more articulate, outgoing and expressive. They must become better talkers. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The most important skill is listening, to learn about the other person. So try not to dominate the conversation. Try to let the other person speak more and listen to him. So the trick is the art of asking good and well-formed questions.
Ask Open ended questions. These are questions that attempt to let the other person talk more. These are questions that do not require an simple answer of YES and NO. Ask questions that begin with 'WHAT', 'HOW' and 'WHY'. This will encourage the other person to speak more.
The art of good conversation centers very much on your ability to ask questions and to listen attentively to the answers. You can lace the conversation with your insights, ideas, and opinions, but you perfect the art and skill of conversation by perfecting the art and skill of asking good, well-worded questions that direct the conversation and give other people an opportunity to express themselves.
In order to be an excellent conversationalist, you must resist the urge to dominate the discussion. The very best conversationalists seem to be low-key, easy-going, cheerful, and genuinely interested in the other person. They seem to be quite content to listen when other people are talking and they make their own contributions to the dialogue rather short and to the point.
Some helpful tips in having successful conversations:
- have a positive attitude
- believe you will learn something
- believe you can offer something as well
- know about current events
- listen always to the other person
Developing effective conversational skills is an investment in your future. By improving your conversational skills you talk with confidence. You have the ability to talk to almost any person attracting friends and business clients twice the rate as you would without such skills.
So prepare for an exciting year ahead!
Club News for January 2009:
In our last club meeting, one of our new members Emmanuel did his first project and Joan Wong also completed her project 9. Let's congratulate them on a job well done.
We also welcome our newest member Dave Tang who participated in club activities like table topics. Congratulations also to Mike Chia who was voted the best table topics speaker of the evening.
All in all, it was a good start of the year for all.
How to be a Good Conversationalist
Have you ever come to a social event like a party and felt awkward? Do you have problem striking a conversation with complete strangers? Do you have trouble having a conversation with people you don't know?
Many people think that the art of good conversation is to speak in an interesting and arresting fashion, to be noted for your humour, ability to tell stories and your general knowledge of a variety of subjects. Many people feel that, if they want to be better at conversation, they must become more articulate, outgoing and expressive. They must become better talkers. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The most important skill is listening, to learn about the other person. So try not to dominate the conversation. Try to let the other person speak more and listen to him. So the trick is the art of asking good and well-formed questions.
Ask Open ended questions. These are questions that attempt to let the other person talk more. These are questions that do not require an simple answer of YES and NO. Ask questions that begin with 'WHAT', 'HOW' and 'WHY'. This will encourage the other person to speak more.
The art of good conversation centers very much on your ability to ask questions and to listen attentively to the answers. You can lace the conversation with your insights, ideas, and opinions, but you perfect the art and skill of conversation by perfecting the art and skill of asking good, well-worded questions that direct the conversation and give other people an opportunity to express themselves.
In order to be an excellent conversationalist, you must resist the urge to dominate the discussion. The very best conversationalists seem to be low-key, easy-going, cheerful, and genuinely interested in the other person. They seem to be quite content to listen when other people are talking and they make their own contributions to the dialogue rather short and to the point.
Some helpful tips in having successful conversations:
- have a positive attitude
- believe you will learn something
- believe you can offer something as well
- know about current events
- listen always to the other person
Developing effective conversational skills is an investment in your future. By improving your conversational skills you talk with confidence. You have the ability to talk to almost any person attracting friends and business clients twice the rate as you would without such skills.
(To view presentation materials used in Advanced Project by one of our members, please double click on the link below.)
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