The Carlton Trail Toastmasters held their annual speech contests on March 14.
Two contestants from both the international and evaluation categories are now moving on to the area competition in Saskatoon on March 23 at McNally Robinson.
“This was an opportunity for our club members to come and put on their best efforts in terms of speaking,” says Adrienne Perrot.
From Saskatoon the members have the opportunity to continue competing until the World competition.
This is a great opportunity for local members to challenge themselves, says Perrot.
“The common theme is that everyone does it to better themselves.”
Speakers for the International Speech competition were give five to seven minutes to speak on a topic.
Competitors Amanda Scott and Matt Hillier, who took first place and second place respectively, will both be moving on to the competition.
Scott’s first place winning speech spoke about Scott’s adventures in Random Act of Kindness day and what she received from it.
This was done in an effort to get herself off the couch.
Scott says she felt selfish from how good the experience made her feel and she reflected on that in her speech.
“Even though I was doing all these great things, how good I felt, I thought this was so selfish how good I felt.”
Evaluation is a big part of Toastmasters since the goal is to improve public speaking skills.
The Evaluation Competition saw three local competitors listen to a speech and are given five minutes to prepare their evaluation.
The competitor then gives a two and a half to five minute evaluation which they are judged on.
Darlene Guenther took first place in the evaluation competition and will be moving on with fellow competitor, Islay Ehlert.
Guenther joined Toastmasters 15 years ago and wanted to be able to express herself better.
“You have all these thoughts and you want to get it out so people can understand you better.”
Even though she joined to better her public speaking skills, Guenther says she has gained the most from the evaluation side of the club.
Guenther says she tends to be a bit critical so learning how to give good critiques was very beneficial to her in dealing with people in everyday life.
