There are many speaking roles at a Toastmaster meeting.  The following are but a few.

Paul Langford was our Toastmaster.  The Toastmaster leads the first half of the meeting.

Lacey Heward gave her Pathways Icebreaker speech.  The Icebreaker speech is the first speech in each of the 10 individualized education tracks that Toastmasters offers.

Heidi Schreiner also gave her Pathways Icebreaker speech.

Ben Thurow lead the extemporaneous speaking for the night.  Everyone spoke off-the-cuff with reference to the topic of spring cleaning:

Ben Thurow:

Nate Otto:

Tim Haukeness:

Lindsay Olson:

Sheila Wilkinson:

 

Toastmasters offers 10 individualized Pathways:

Each Pathway has five levels:

1. Mastering fundamentals

2. Learning your style

3. Increasing knowledge

4. Building Skills

5. Demonstrating expertise

Each pathway contains two to three projects per level for a total of at least 14 projects per path. Each project focuses on a single, specific theme to help members improve their communication and leadership skills in a particular area.

 

Featured speakers included Jeff McRaven

and a visiting Toastmaster whose home club is in southern Wisconsin giving a talk on leadership:

We had an interesting round of Table Topics.  Table Topics features spontaneous speeches 1-2 minutes in length in response to random questions.

First Ivan Stoyanov tackled, “Have you ever stolen anything?”

Ben Thurow responded to, “If you ordered takeout and didn’t want it, would you go pick it up anyway?”

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Nate answered the question, “How much money would it take to make you happy?”

John Satorius articulated a response for, “How virtuous are you on a scale of 1 to 10?”

Lacey Heward was given, “What makes you jealous?”

Finally, Paul Langford had us all laughing with his response to: “If you knew your significant other would be better with someone else, would you tell her?”

 

 

 

The evening started out with Melissa Eslinger, visiting Toastmaster from Heart of Eau Claire Toastmasters, practicing her speech for the W3 Area Speech Contest.

She used a change of garb to mark a major transition in her speech.

Next up was Paul Langford.

Finally, Bob gave his first speech project found in Toastmasters’ new Pathways education system.  Bob chose the Leadership Pathway and explained why.

Mary Hiss was the Topics Master for the night and provided entertaining topics for extemporaneous speeches based on the writings found in fortune cookies.

John Satorius:  “You will be fortunate in everything you put your hands on.”

Nate Otto gave a speech that had us rolling laughing…”A foolish man listens to his heart. A wise man listens to cookies.”

Sheila Wilkinson used her fortune to talk about the best thing that could happen to her this week.

Jeff McRaven spoke on, “He who throws dirt loses ground.”

Finally…Ben Thurow.

The traditional Icebreaker mints and ribbons were awarded to two of our new members who gave their Icebreaker speeches.  An Icebreaker speech is the first speech a new member gives and is a 4-6 minute speech about themselves.

John Satorius:

Lacey Heward

Highlighting our lineup of prepared speeches was Heidi Schreiner practicing a speech for the Western Division TLI (Toastmaster Leadership Institute) that was held in Eau Claire at the end of February.

We had several members doing impromptu speaking.

First, Mary Hiss addressed the question, “What qualities would you like to inherit from your parents?”.

The next question addressed was, “What three qualities would make you a good leader?”.

Nate Otto answered, “What 3 objects would you save from Ivan’s house if there were a fire?”.

Bob Swanson was asked the question, “What would you like to be famous for?”.

Finally, our newest member Lindsay Olson went for a double header!!!  She first answered, “What would you not want in a friend?” and then “What state would you like to visit?”.

What a special night!!!  We had two new members giving Icebreaker speeches.  The Icebreaker speech is the first speech a member delivers.  It is a 4 to 6 minute speech where the member introduces themselves.

First, John Satorius delivered his.

Then Lacey Heward gave hers.

We had other prepared and unprepared speeches throughout the evening as well.

Congratulations to our two newest members!!!