What is Toastmasters? I had seen the poster in Heartland for two weeks, and it sounded like training for how to toast. When I was curious about it, a smart teacher told me let my curiosity lead me to find out what is, so I took a free trial. Before I approached the classroom in the basement, I checked the word “toastmaster” on my phone. From what I could gather, it is a international non-profit organization where you can push your boundaries in the following:
– Public Speaking
– Leadership
– Impromptu Speaking
– Networking
– Confidence
Sounds good, right? But what exactly is Toastmasters? When I finished the first meeting, I found it was really good, not only for me. It was a small group meeting with 8 people practicing their speaking. Everybody sat around a long table with a cupboard with your name behind you. There was a hostmaster to lead others to talk and speech. They have a nice format that makes the meeting very efficient. First they will give two words as a word-of-the-day, then everybody applauds for two “ice-breakers” where you make a speech about your life, experiences, or opinions. Surely, they should try to use of the word-of-day. After that, the others will make a prompt speech also needing to use the words. The final part is the most interesting and useful: there are four persons who give comments about each other’s speech from different angles. Moreover, the final-final part is that another one will evaluate the evaluations of the four people just now.
On top of this, they were “really” native speakers—not a teacher—so you could learn how they speak in daily life and in business meetings. Even though we had presentations in classrooms and mock interviews, this true environment could give you more experience.
These people who were in this group were so nice, they applaud for everybody’s speech for encouragement When they knew I was a student at Heartland and this was my first time to join the club, they gave me more care. What I could see was full of encouragement and motivation from them, while I stood in front of them giving my speech. I have learned not only the two words but also how to speak positively and how to make a polite comment to others’, I thought this might be the greatest part from the 45 minutes meeting.
So I highly recommend everyone should take a free trial, it was great for leaning public or prompt speaking, and it was also a place where you can improve the confidence and Canada networking.