Imagination
sparkled through the evening as we listened to creative insights
on this theme.
We all related to Jill McCormick’s reflections on imagination
when she marveled at how their imaginative minds work, and how
our imaginative juices often flow when sparked by children’s
thoughts and antics. As always, Jill chaired an excellent
meeting, smoothly bridging between speakers, and generally
creating a comfortable, easy atmosphere to help allay fears and
nervousness to bring out the best in us all.
Ingenious was an ingenious idea to use for the Word of the Week.
Wordsmith, Stuart Manning, had great success with this as we
heard it incorporated into a number of roles and speeches. Being
a person who revels in words, Stuart enjoyed the numerous
imaginative ways many of us used them in this meeting.
Ah Ha! Karen Arnold, The Wizard of Ahs took the new guests into
account when explaining this valued role. Her explanation left
no doubt that she knew the specific “transgressions” she was
looking for and she would have no mercy. In the end we all knew
exactly where our faults lay. This is a Good Thing – our minds
might even catch us before she does next time!
Neville Cohen marveled that with the touch of a finger we can
Google or Yahoo simply anything we have ever imagined. For
example, he had been intrigued by an Einstein quote Don Ekroth
had once used, so he looked it up on the internet, knowing that
it would enhance his Inspiration on imagination. The information
he gleaned from this site enabled him to develop a very
interesting and inspiring speech!
You can almost see Parvaneh Bahrami rubbing her hands together
in anticipation before she begins her jokes – this role is
always fun for her. This time she really ‘had us’ in the end. It
wasn’t appetizing but it sure was funny
.
Jessica Li did a very good job as our Timer. It isn’t easy
keeping on top of it, especially when you are new to the role.
Our guests would have had no difficulty understanding exactly
what the Timer does, and because of her clear explanation at the
beginning of the meeting they wouldn’t have blinked when she
rang the bell.
Ruth Sol must have really enjoyed preparing the Table Topics for
this session. Many of them brought back ‘reading memories’ for
some of us – such as the imaginations of Jules Verne and
Jonathan Swift. She introduced Imagination as something that is
sparked by all of the senses, colour, music, and the worlds of
science and creativity. While a few of us found some of her
topics were challenging, we found all of them stimulated our
imaginations – leading to some very entertaining mini-speeches.
Parvaneh’s speech on the ‘sixth sense – the mind’, won The Best
Table Topics Speaker ribbon for her.
Don Ekroth, the Table Topics Evaluator won The Best Evaluator
award. Once again Don’s experience as an evaluator shone as he
set examples for us: by sometimes comparing a speaker’s
performance this time, with observations he had noticed about
that member on previous occasions; by sometimes illustrating his
suggestions by giving his own version of a beginning or an
ending to give the Speaker some ideas for ‘next time’.
Our Host, Mahmoud Moazami, challenged us to “Imagine a world
with no imagination. Think about it. This lectern was one day
just in someone’s imagination.” Personal stories and humour led
us to the Toast: “To the power of human imagination.” Having
been our Toastmaster not many weeks ago, Mahmoud was well warmed
up to introduce our Speaker for the evening. He had the pleasure
of introducing Elma Ong and her Ice Breaker, which was titled
“Twins”.
Now when we look at Elma we wonder what her identical sister
looks like. Oh yes, they are identical but, for instance, does
her sister have the same captivating smile?
Elma had our attention as soon as she looked out at us and
smiled before she began. Four to six minutes is not very long in
which to fit one’s life story (which some of us actually
succinctly do!). Elma chose to focus on one major part of her
life – her experiences growing up as an identical twin. She
wisely even narrowed this down to two areas: attention and
competitiveness. Through a well constructed speech threaded with
humour and information about herself, we were able to get to
know Elma a little bit better, and appreciate the strengths she
already has for public speaking.
When we have new members speaking formally for the first time,
we look for experienced Speech Evaluators to give them their
first ‘formal feedback’. Who better for this than Dave Stewart.
Dave gave the perfect balance between praise and constructive
suggestions, always delivered in his easy, often witty manner.
While he had some very good suggestions for Elma, he
particularly appreciated one of her major strengths because it
is something most new members have great trouble overcoming: Eye
Contact. Quite a feat for someone who has only been a member for
two weeks!
General Evaluating the performances of the members on the
Agenda, Pam Elliott was impressed overall with the uses of
Imagination, and by the entire cast of players. She found the
meeting stimulating and fun.
There will be a meeting next Monday, May 22nd. Since this is a
holiday (Victoria Day), we will have many opportunities to have
fun practicing in a more informal setting. Looking forward to
seeing you there!
Victoria Day – May 22, 2006
An evening of Fun and Practice,
Practice, Practice
.
Almost everyone who attended this holiday meeting had never
before had a chance to practice evaluations, so this was a very
beneficial opportunity both for them and for the club.
Because there were just a few of us, the atmosphere was laid
back and casual. We had no formal Chairman, in fact the only
person assigned any role at all was the Timer, and she was
happily able to participate in all of the other activities as
well.
We began in our seats by giving everyone a chance to briefly
speak on a given topic. (Our club used to open every meeting
this way many years ago.) This topic was “What was the highlight
of your weekend?” Clearly, the joy of family activities was
mentioned most of all.
If there were a theme at all, it would have been Table Topics
and Evaluations because this was the meat of the meeting. Four
baskets on the lectern held choices for the topics. One basket
held a number of General Topics from which to draw, in another
there were topics to be used as the base for a Story, another
had topics for ‘Self Debate’ (half the time the Speaker spoke
‘for’ and the other half of the time was devoted to strong
opposition of the topic), and the last basket held the name of a
Colour (“What inspires you when you think of this colour?”).
Everyone had two opportunities to speak and to evaluate. We
began by evaluating the person to our right, and then we
evaluated the person to our left. These first-time evaluators
are definitely ready to evaluate in our regular club meetings –
every one of them capably used all the right ingredients needed
to give their speakers encouragement and a boost.
Another advantage of this small, more casual group was the
opportunity to get to know each other a little better. We left
with warm feelings of an evening well spent.
May 29th we will be ‘back to normal’, with a fuller contingent
of members in attendance and a complete Agenda. Members please
be in touch today to get this next meeting underway. Everyone,
including guests, are welcome to join in the fun!
Club 1085
.
