President Glenn Lewis opened the meeting at 1:05 p.m., and introduced the invocation leader, Eric Darnell. He read a passage from Walden, by Henry David Thoreau.
Glenn led the Pledge of Allegiance and welcomed everyone to the meeting. He invited first-time visitor Bethany Furkin to introduce herself.
Glenn then opened the business part of the meeting. Eric Darnell made a motion that the minutes for the May 6, 2009 meeting be approved as written. The motion was seconded and approved.
Glenn announced that Toastmasters Area 66 has scheduled a Humorous Speech Contest for Tuesday, August 18, from 5:30 to 7 p.m., at the Humana Conference Center. He encouraged club members to enter or just go to listen and learn. Perry Chang said that Peace Speakers has never had a member enter this particular contest.
Eva Stimson, chair of the nominating committee, presented a report from the committee (attached), containing a proposed new slate of officers for the next club year. The officers will be voted on at the June 17 meeting, and nominations may be made from the floor. New officers need to be in place and names reported to Toastmasters International by June 30.
Glenn introduced Toastmaster Eric Darnell, who invited members of the Evaluation Team to explain their responsibilities: Speech Evaluator #1—Glenn Lewis; Speech Evaluator #2—Perry Chang; Table Topics—Glenn Lewis (replacing Betsy Blocker, who had a last-minute conflict); Timer—Deborah Hoff; Ah Counter/Grammarian—Eva Stimson; Vote Counter—Perry Chang.
Eva Stimson introduced the word of the day: modulation (mah-ju-LAY-shun)
1. a regulating according to measure or proportion, tempering
2. an inflection of the tone or pitch of the voice
3. a change from one musical key to another
Example: By listening to the modulation of the speaker’s voice, we could tell when she was getting excited.
Eric introduced Gary Warren, who gave his Project #1 “Ice Breaker” speech from the Competent Communication Program Manual. Gary spoke about his experience of moving to Boston to get a library science degree.
Eric then introduced Joelle Anderson, who gave her Project #1 “Ice Breaker” speech, titled “Led to Louisville.”
Eric introduced Kim Kaberle, who gave a practice speech titled “You Gotta Let Go of the Boat to Walk on Water.” She planned to give the speech at a women’s conference in Louisville on June 6.
Eric introduced Glenn Lewis to lead Table Topics. He invited four people to speak on the topic of “Seeds.” Each person drew a packet of seeds out of a bag and spoke about them.
Eric then called for reports from the evaluation team. Speech Evaluator #1, Glenn Lewis, said Gary Warren’s speech was well organized and showed Gary had an interesting biography. He said Gary appeared nervous at first, but became more at ease as he got into his speech. He suggested that Gary work on making the speech less choppy, on using more eye contact, and on memorizing the closing to make it less abrupt.
Speech Evaluator #2, Perry Chang, said Joelle Anderson gave a great first speech. It seemed effortless, and showed evidence of much preparation. He suggested she work on vocal variety and restate her three themes at the end. Perry also reminded everyone that it is important to always have someone at the lectern.
Eric invited the whole group to evaluate Kim Kaberle’s practice speech. Most of the comments were positive. Among them: good title; effective use of hand gestures and humor; strong ending; appealing stories. One suggestion offered was to get to the point more quickly.
Timer Deborah Hoff reported the following times:
Gary Warren’s speech 6:27
Joelle Anderson’s speech 4:51
Kim Kaberle’s speech 8:24
Table Topics:
Eva Stimson 1:04
Perry Chang 2:18
Deborah Hoff 1:10
Eric Darnell 1:06
Speech evaluation #1 2:15
Speech evaluation #2 2:56
Ah Counter/Grammarian Eva Stimson said she had counted 41 space fillers, 9 sentence fragments, and a couple of grammatical errors. She reported that the word of the day had not been used, but it was subsequently used once by Perry Chang.
Vote counter Perry Chang reported that Eric Darnell received the most votes for best Table Topics speech. Eric received a trophy to keep until the next meeting.
Following closing remarks, Toastmaster Eric Darnell turned the meeting over to President Glenn Lewis. Glenn encouraged everyone to attend the next Peace Speakers Toastmasters meeting, at 1 p.m. June 17 in Conference Room B, so that a quorum will be present to elect the new slate of officers. He adjourned the meeting at 2:05 p.m.
