The first meeting of the program year started with a short speech by the new President, Michiko. She asked us some important questions like what our goals for the year are and reminded us of the importance of embodying the club motto "Try, Grow, Innovate for the Future."
We had two relatively new members making their debuts as Toastmaster of the Day (or TMOD for short, who is the master of ceremonies) and Ah-Counter, who pays attention to unnecessary and/or ineffectve use of our utterances such as fillers and uninteded repetition of words and phrases. Both of them made a solid debut. Mayumi served as TMOD, facilitating the entire education portion of the meeting smoothly. Yuko gave a detailed report at the end of the meeting demonstrating how attentive she was during the meeting. Congratulations, both!!
Your Body Speaks
In Prepared Speech session, we had two speakers working on a project called "Effective Body Language." Body language is an element of public speaking that a speaker can utilize to enhance the impact of what they say. It includes posture, hand gestures, facial expressions, and movement on the stage among others. As shown in the photo, a speaker can stay away from the lectern to look confident. This posture makes it possible for the speaker to use hand gestures freely and moves away from behind the lectern if they choose to. It looks simple, but when it comes to actually doing it, it is not as easy. Peaople tend to clasp their hands in front of htier body or raising their hands to the chest level, signs of insecure mind and nervousness. (I'm guilty of the latter myself.) It requires constant training and Toastmasters meetings are some of the best places for that. Since there are a lot more aspects in body language, we need to keep practicing with effective use of body language in mind.
We had two relatively new members making their debuts as Toastmaster of the Day (or TMOD for short, who is the master of ceremonies) and Ah-Counter, who pays attention to unnecessary and/or ineffectve use of our utterances such as fillers and uninteded repetition of words and phrases. Both of them made a solid debut. Mayumi served as TMOD, facilitating the entire education portion of the meeting smoothly. Yuko gave a detailed report at the end of the meeting demonstrating how attentive she was during the meeting. Congratulations, both!!
Your Body Speaks
In Prepared Speech session, we had two speakers working on a project called "Effective Body Language." Body language is an element of public speaking that a speaker can utilize to enhance the impact of what they say. It includes posture, hand gestures, facial expressions, and movement on the stage among others. As shown in the photo, a speaker can stay away from the lectern to look confident. This posture makes it possible for the speaker to use hand gestures freely and moves away from behind the lectern if they choose to. It looks simple, but when it comes to actually doing it, it is not as easy. Peaople tend to clasp their hands in front of htier body or raising their hands to the chest level, signs of insecure mind and nervousness. (I'm guilty of the latter myself.) It requires constant training and Toastmasters meetings are some of the best places for that. Since there are a lot more aspects in body language, we need to keep practicing with effective use of body language in mind.