Sengkang West Bursary Education Awards 2019 - written by In Tiam

Sengkang West Bursary Education Awards 2019

Outstanding school students were recognized for their success at this year’s Education Awards Ceremony, which took place at the Anchorvale CC on 12th, 13th, 19th and 20th January.

Anchorvale Toastmasters Club members Alice Ow, Pang In Tiam and Norman Tan represented the club as the emcees to host and facilitate this grand event with Dr. Lam Pin Min, Senior Minister of State for Health & Transport, Grassroots Adviser to Sengkang West GROs. 

The ceremony saw school students from the Sengkang West receive their certificates and cheque for their achievements in academy results.  This year saw record numbers of awardee, more than 3,000 awardees across more than 30 sessions of the ceremony.Sengkang West Zone A, B, C, D, E, K, and L Bursary Education Awards was held on 12 and 13 January 2019.  Sengkang West Zone F, M, J, N, AVNC, FVNC and EMA (Zone A - N RC) Bursary Education Awards was held on next weekend 19 and 20 January 2019.

Our emcees had given a very strong, effective and high energy opening to kick start the event. Followed by a keynote was delivered by Dr. Lam and highlighted Sengkang West has the most awardee compare with other area and various efforts to grow our talents. 

Our emcees then warmed up the crowd and invited all awardee to give a big hug and thank you to their parents.  They continued to engage the awardee and interviewed them.

‘Without support from my parent, I won’t be able to achieve so much.  I want to tell them how much I love them’, said one of the awardee. 

Besides the award presentation and photo session, our emcee also collaborated with Sengkang West RCs and Anchorvale Youth Executive Community (YEC) members and share a lot of events which are happening now.  Awardee and family also actively visit YEC booth to find out more details.

It was wonderful 4 days for our emcees to step up and host the event for 9 hours continuously every day.  It always seems impossible until it is done.  Yes, they did it and entire ceremony was conducted successfully. We would like to take this opportunity to say a BIG THANK YOU to Alice Ow, Pang In Tiam and Norman Tan....and to Anchorvale TM club!

-In Tiam

Book Review: "The Art of Public Speaking by Dale Carnegie"- written by Ram

I was nervous;

My palms were sweaty; and
I had butterflies in my stomach.

This is how I felt one day, when I was standing in front of hundreds of students at a school event. All these years, I always tried to avoid all situations wherein I would have to be on a stage or speak in public. But something got into me last year, and all I wanted was to learn and improve my public speaking skills, and that is when toastmasters came into my life’s journey.

There is a Buddhist proverb,

“When the student is ready, Teacher will appear.”

Do you have Glossophobia?

Forget about you and me, even Google is scared of public speaking. Check out the first fear it lists out in search results. (hahaha)

Well, some individuals may feel a slight nervousness at the very first thought of public speaking, while others experience full-fledged panic and fear. Same was the case with me; I hated giving public speeches; but then it vanished when I joined Toastmasters Club in October 2018.

It was 8th December, Christmas special chapter meeting, Anchorvale TM's club president, Chee Sian took up a role of Santa Clause and gifted 3 books on public speaking written by Dale Carnegie to club members, and I received "The Art of Public Speaking by Dale Carnegie".

The book is indeed a classic, published in 1915, and covered basic lessons of public speaking. Though the book was published 100 years ago, it’s clear that nothing has changed over the years in terms of information, tips and tricks mentioned in the book to become a better speaker. All the tips mentioned in the book about how to make your content better, and the ways to articulate it more effectively, the methods to enhance voice and tone, the importance of rhetoric’s etc it just perfect.

The most important message shared in the book is very simple and straight forward. You must learn to speak by speaking; Practice, practice and PRACTICE.

Each chapter has extensive exercises but I'm not sure of their effectiveness without a mentor to check the results, or the progress. While reading initial chapters, I managed to answer the questions given at the end of every chapter but eventually I skipped I felt the need of mentor/evaluator to cover the exercises.

Overall, this book is wonderful resource especially if you are beginner. It covers vital aspects of speaking in public; showing up, standing confidently on stage, getting rid of monotonous tone, effective body language etc. For new people who want to enhance their craft, this book will help as it gives ample explanation and importance to all the skills needed to improve. I think, once you start speaking in a group, you may start referring from this book and then you can measure yourself as to how are you doing.

Key take away from the book

MASTER YOUR FEAR

Giving a speech isn’t a matter of becoming fearless; it’s a matter of mastering your fear.

Consider below 4 Basic factors to be an effective public speaker

1.      Be Absorbed by Your Subject.  If you feel deeply about your subject you will be able to think of little else. Concentration is a process of distraction from less important matters.

2.      It’s equally important to have something to say. If you haven’t prepared your material and practiced your speech, doubts and misgivings are sure to assail you the minute you open your mouth. To avoid this, the author advises memorizing at least the first few sentences of your speech.

3.      After preparing for success, expect it. Expecting success doesn’t mean you should be overconfident and complacent. Rather, maintain your humility – not a cowering, servile humility, but a sort of vibrant humbleness, an eternal openness to improvement. Cast aside your self-involved fears, and be willing to succeed.

4.      Assume Mastery Over Your Audience. If you assume it you can almost invariably make it yours. If you assume the negative you are sure to be negative.

MASTER YOUR PRESENTATION SKILLS

The below ideas help in engaging your audience.

Hammer your Monotony tone; How would you feel if someone plays only one key while performing on piano? You may wonder why this guy is hitting only one key all the times, why can’t he use other keys! People will feel same when we use same tone across our speech.

Then, what would be the solution? Emphasis is a matter of comparing and contrasting your speech’s central ideas and a basic way to do that is to stress important words.

Practice your way to effective body language; but it would be wonderful if gestures come spontaneously out of true feeling. 

The next way to use your imagination is to image the speech you’re about to give. In other words, prior to delivering a speech, you should create mental images of how that speech will go.

EXERCISES TO BOOST YOUR CONFIDENCE

How to Develop the Carrying Power of the Voice

·         It is not necessary to speak loudly in order to be heard at a distance. It is necessary only to speak correctly. If you will only use your voice correctly, you will not have much difficulty in being heard.

·         A hard-fought basketball or tennis game is an efficient way of practising deep breathing.

·         Voice is a series of air vibrations. To strengthen it two things are necessary: more air or breath, and more vibration.

·         Breath is the very basis of voice. As a bullet with little powder behind it will not have force and carrying power, so the voice that has little breath behind it will be weak. Not only will deep breathing from the diaphragm.

Purity of Voice

·         This quality is sometimes destroyed by wasting the breath. Carefully control the breath, using only as much as is necessary for the production of tone. Utilize all that you give out. Take in breath like a prodigal; in speaking, give it out like a miser.

Voice Suggestions

·         Never attempt to force your voice when hoarse.

·         Do not drink cold water when speaking. The sudden shock to the heated organs of speech will injure the voice.

·         Avoid pitching your voice too high--it will make it raspy. A wide range will give you facility in making numerous changes of pitch.

·         You can make even a whisper audible to all if you place your voice correctly.

·         The way to do this is to pitch it forward.

·         Practice this by holding your hand before your face and forcefully saying words such as “crash,” “dash,” “whirl” and “buzz.”

·         Do not form the habit of listening to your voice when speaking. You will need your brain to think of what you are saying--reserve your observation for private practise.

Concluding Hints

·         No urgency.  Haste shows lack of control.

·         Do not apologize, it won’t help. Go straight forward.

·         Increase your vocabulary.

Conclusion:

There’s only one way to become an effective public speaker: practice, practice, practice. That being said, there are techniques that’ll help you succeed. For starters, avoid monotony by effectively using emphasis, let your gestures emanate from sincere feeling, turn your audience into a crowd and improve your voice by deep breathing. Finally, test your arguments and the arguments of your opponents, and use imagery both to prepare for and to construct your speeches.

But, what happens if you keep practicing wrongly, you will end up perfecting wrong way. And joining Toastmasters club helps you build that confidence in front of audience. If you don’t know where to start or how to start, Anchorvale TM Club would be right choice.

Quotes from the book:

• Practice, practice and PRACTICE; If no one else will listen to you, listen to yourself
• Destiny is not a matter of chance. It is a matter of choice.
• The worst punishment that human ingenuity has ever been able to invent is extreme monotony, solitary confinement.
• If you believe you will fail, there is no hope for you. You will.
• The first sign of greatness is when a man does not attempt to look and act great.
• You must learn to speak by speaking.
• Speech-giving isn’t a matter of becoming fearless; it’s a matter of mastering your fear.
• Concentration is a process of distraction from less important matters.
• Buildings have need of a good Foundation that lies so much exposed to the Weather.--WILLIAM PENN.
• One day Ennui was born from Uniformity.--MOTTE.
• "Get your principles right," said Napoleon, "and the rest is a matter of detail."

Ram

133rd Chapter Meeting Recap

New years are all about fresh starts and new beginnings, however it’s also a great time to take stock of the year behind before looking ahead. Our Sergeant-At-Arms, Narayana, kicked off the 1^st chapter meeting of the year by asking us to state our 2018 New Year’s Resolutions, whether we’ve followed through with them, and our new New Year’s Resolutions for 2019. 

While many of our club members shared their wish to be more physically active and to improve in their public speaking skills, some were understandably reluctant to make new resolutions for this year given their struggles to stick with their last year’s resolutions. 

Nevertheless, with hard work and determination, I’m sure we’ll follow through on all our resolutions this year! #famouslastwords

Instead of some fancy speech telling us how great the New Year is and to make this our best year yet, our Club President Chee Sian decided that actions speaks louder than words—he used the President’s Opening Address to list down the many exciting events open to members to partake in in the coming weeks! Some are listed below (you may contact him for more details/to sign up if you’re interested):

•        Master-of-Ceremony position for Education Awards (19^th/20^th Jan)
•        Toastmasters International Speech, Evaluation and Table Topics Contest (23^rd Feb)

Next came the prepared speeches. Hilda gave her icebreaker where she spoke fondly of her encounter with a handsome blue-eyed Irish boy in Halong Bay, and how he gave her an unexpected lesson on trying new things, even if it scares her. Zhaomin regaled us with travelogues of her perilous trekking adventures in Nepal and farm stay in New Zealand. She also urged us to be open to new experiences instead of merely creating strict New Year Resolutions & plans. Andy (this meeting’s Best Speaker!) shared about his unique AirBnB experience in Osaka where he happened to stay, unknowingly, in the slums and red-light district of Japan! O.o He lived to tell the tale, and convinced us to give both Japan and AirBnB a try this year.

From the Advanced Manuals, In Tiam let us in on Project Skyrocket. He gave us an in-depth and very informative sharing on how to skyrocket to the top of our field using Steve Job’s style of presentation and persuasion. Last but not least, Chee Sian got us laughing with his topic on ‘Reputation Management’, where he recounted how he kindly advised a schoolmate with the same name as him to change his song choice for the school talentime, leading that schoolmate to win runner-up in that contest and thus giving Chee Sians a good name in that school.

After the break, our experienced and competent evaluators Deepthi, Rama, Valliappan, Norman and Salma (this meeting’s Best Evaluator!) gave the prepared speech speakers (and the rest of us) many helpful and invaluable tips on how to better our presentations. Their suggestions on how to improve speech content, speaking style and presentation slides were both enlightening and constructive!

Next was the most exciting segment of the day—Table Topics! Facilitated by none other than our Table Topics master Valli, who gave us a range of new year-themed table topics to choose from. 

The co-winners for Table Topics were Sakinah—a young first time guest to Anchorvale CC Toastmasters Club, and Hemant—our resident Table-Topics-first-speaker! Sakinah recounted the times when she lent a helping hand to others in the past year, and Hemant expounded on the benefits of having New Year resolutions, even if we break them.

Special thanks to CP Yuen—new member and first-time Timer, and Sarah Ong—first-time Ah Counter for their wonderful Timer and Ah Counter’ report! And of course not forgetting our trusty Toastmaster of the Day, Rusman, who facilitated and held the whole meeting together!

#Happy133

-Written by Audrey Lim

2018 Christmas Special Chapter meeting!!!!

Just as you thought Christmas Chapter meetings tend to have the lowest attendance, Anchorvale CC Toastmasters Club defied all expectations to conduct one of our most successful Chapter Meetings in 2018! With a special Christmas buffet feast, Christmas Lucky Draw and the attendance of past Club Presidents all the way from 2013 to 2017, guests and members alike were treated to a grand party of friendship and celebration that is likely to be remembered for time to come!

Past Club President 2014-2015 Sathya kicked off the meeting with a thoughtful question to all on how we would like to give back during the year-end festivities. Interesting food for thought, especially given how easily we tend to forget that Christmas is also the season for giving.

This broke the ice between members (*the room was really cold inside) and Chief Elf aka Toastmaster of the Day, Norman next introduced Club President Chee Sian, who literally took up the role of Santa Clause to give out not ONE, but THREE books on public speaking by Dale Carnegie to Club members! Looking forward to your book reviews soon guys :D

Appreciation can make a day and it can even change a life, but today it can be used as the Word of the Day as our Language Evaluator John Tan encouraged us all to embrace and appreciate the people all around us. I myself, appreciated the Christmas buffet lunch very much.

On that note, food seems to be a rather pertinent topic for today as even Jerry Lim, ACB, ALB shared his exploits of cooking for his Advanced Project 5 ‘The Motivational Speech’. The other project speeches covered a plethora of topics, ranging from managing employee expectations (Andy, TM – Pathways Level 1 P2), riding the wave of emotions from happy (Rama, TM – Pathways Level 2, P5) to sadness and regret (Raymond, VC5, EC5 – Pathways Level 1, P2). We also covered inspirational life stories (Jeff, TM – Pathways Level 2 P5) and even had time for a mock interview session with IT Pang and his family (In Tiam, CC – Advanced Project 2 The Interview Show)

After voting, it was time to dive back into our favourite – FOOD. As guests enjoyed the refreshment break, it was also an opportune time to celebrate my (ahem!) our members’ birthdays for December. Special shoutout to the CC Managers, BiÉn and Gabriel who took time off their busy schedules to join us for the celebration.

CC and RC Managers, Gabriel and Bi En with our Club’s birthday boy and girl, Norman and Zhaomin

 After binge-eating, we settled nicely into a food coma and enjoyed the project evaluations that ensued. Jenny, our club mentor delivered a positive and encouraging evaluation for Jerry while Pallavi performed a detailed, surgical analysis of what worked or did not work for Andy. Mithun and Annabelle both delivered concise and insightful evaluations for their respective speakers while Roger gave a tour de force of his evaluation prowess that left us in awe.

Salma took to the stage next and brought an uplifting change in her turn as table topics master. Literally, the topic would change as speakers were on stage, meaning they had to be even more quick-footed to connect their story to the image flashed on screen. Kudos to the brave souls who persevered undeterred!

 Salma introduced a unique set of Christmas themed Table Topics

 Next up was Zulhafni, severely underutilised in his role as Ah-Counter today but he delivered by gaving an in-depth analysis of everyone’s speech patterns and use of pause fillers. If only we had the chance to hear him speak in another role, LE next time perhaps?

Speaking of LE, John Tan was back to show his appreciation to speakers who used the Word of the Day. He also pointed our several ‘’Wow’’ words, good use of the English language and gently encouraged us all to improve. Spoken like a true English teacher.

Finally before the meeting came to a close, Chee Sian in his closing address delivered what everyone was waiting for – the Lucky Draw prizes! Congrats again to the 8 lucky winners of our Christmas giveaway, sponsored none other than our beloved club mentor, Jenny!

What a memorable meeting it was indeed!

 Best Speaker: Raymond Zhong, VC5, EC5

Best Evaluator: Roger Yap, CC, CL

Best Table Topics: Yu Kang (Jeff’s son)

Best Speaker award goes to Raymond Zhong, VC5, EC5

Best Evaluator award goes to Roger Yap, CC, CL

Best Table Topics award goes to Yu Kang (Jeff’s son)

Written by: Norman Tan, ACB, CL

131st Chapter Meeting Recap

Valliappan Selvamani, Sergeant-At-Arms and Toastmaster of the Day, began the 131st Chapter Meeting by asking each one of us about the goal we had set for 2018, how successful we were in accomplishing it, as well as about the goal for year 2019. Year 2018 has been a terrible year for me, and I had not set any goal for myself. I have been attending lectures and seminars by academic professors. I found their talks dry and sleepy, therefore I have set my goal in improving my public speaking skill. I am doing historical research in my free time; therefore, I am sharing my research findings in my speeches in Toastmaster meetings. By taking feedback from my fellow toastmasters, I plan to make my speeches more lively and energetic.

The next session was “Prepared Speeches Session”. The first prepared speech was delivered by Anthony Lin, and the purpose was how to raise our financial awareness on current financial scams. He began his speech by sharing his own “scam” experience. We have learnt much financial terms from his speech.

Next Speaker, Sarah Ong’s speech was all about importance of sleep, and the key take away was we should sleep at least 7-9 hours per day. Rama Krishna delivered a message showcasing importance of communication.

Third speaker, Rusman spoke about qualities of a good leader as it happened so did our fifth speaker Jeff. I picked up some important leadership skills from bth of their speeches.

Being the fourth speaker, I shared many of my memorable experience during my primary school which was the Griffiths Primary School. Helena’s prepared speech was about the horrible effects of diabetes, the pictures in her PowerPoint slides further emphasized her message.

After the refreshment, our distinguished guests from Choa Chu Kang Toastmasters Club, George Chew, Lee Chin Teck, Aaron Ting, as well as our members, Nareesh BN,  Muthu Ganesh, Wee Chee Sian, last but not least, Jenny Au gave constructive and wonderful suggestions to all our speakers.

As Table Topics Master, Narayana Rao picked a number topics regarding “Singapore”, many participants came forward to speak and overall enthusiasm added colour and delight to the session.

Special thanks to Audrey Lim to her timer’s report, Muthu Ganesh’s Language Evaluator’s report, Freeya’s An Counter’s report, and Chee Sian’s thank you note and Award Presentation. Best speaker ribbon was handed over to Rusman, Best Evaluator Ribbon was handed over to Aaron and the best Table topic speaker award was received by George Chew.

I had a wonderful afternoon with Anchorvale Toastmaster’s Chapter Meeting, wherein I learnt a lot of tips and skills on public speaking and leadership, which are useful and precious to me. I am looking forward to the next Christmas Special Chapter Meeting on 8th December.

-Written by Lucas Lui

(More of my speeches could be found at https://www.linkedin.com/in/luikinfai84/detail/recent-activity/posts/ )

130th Chapter Meeting Recap

"Individual commitment to a group effort--that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work”

- Vince Lombardi

Kanagavelu Ganesan, Sergeant-At-Arms of the evening, began the 130^th Chapter Meeting by asking everyone how we contribute to saving the environment. While most shared that they use recycled bags while grocery shopping, bring our own bottles, cups etc., there was one unique response that intrigued me. Lucas shared that he would clean and collate Styrofoam boxes after using them, and eventually send them to one of the recycling companies in Hong Kong to do the job. And I thought the extent to which Lucas has gone to, deserves praise and commendation, and will encourage more people to contribute in saving the environment.

Next on the list, we have the Language Evaluator, Zulhafni Zulkeflee, introducing the word of the day ‘obfuscate’. Then, we went on to the five prepared speeches by Andy Ang, Wee Chee Sian, Rama Krishna, Helena Lim and Robert Chen respectively. Andy shared with us the magical recipe (healthy real food) of losing weight. Chee Sian took us back in time and told about history of his hometown. Rama Krishna spoke about how he started reading novels and how that became one of his favorite hobby now. Helena shared about different types of Diabetes. Robert, guest from NUSS Toastmasters Club, tried to sell a toaster! It was a wonderful presentation on sales technique.  

After short refreshment break (Thanks to Jenny for Yummy corn and boiled potatoes!!), the evaluation session started with Jeff Lin, Zulhafni Zulkeflee, Valliappan Selvamani, Hu Richen and finally, Jenny Au. And If have successfully reached this point, and read my “detailed report on the evaluation session” I probably have fulfilled my goal of explaining the word of the day, ‘obfuscate’.

Yes, I meant to confuse the readers in my previous paragraph with the sole reason to explain ‘obfuscate’. The meaning of this word is to make something less clear and harder to understand, especially with an intention. By doing so, I hope readers are able to remember the meaning of this word through experiential learning. However, if you are not bewildered by the brief report in the third paragraph, please pardon me for my obfuscating attempt.

Nevertheless, let me take you through the snippets of last major segment of the Chapter Meeting the Table Topics. Lucas Lui, the Table Topic Master, introduced a refreshing theme on how we would react in the case of an (extreme) emergency. An example of a question is: “Given a situation where you are in the lift with two other passengers descending from the 40^th floor. Halfway through the journey, the lift plunges down in high speed, what will you do?” Even though the nature of these questions tends to instigate a type of answer, the questions still stimulate our brain to think of how we ought to respond in such absurd situations.

Certainly, the evening would not have been possible if not for the coordination and communication between the President, the Executive Committee and some committed members. For instance, the intended member who volunteered to be the Toastmaster of the Day fell sick the last minute and could not make it for the meeting. However, Muthu Ganesh immediately volunteered himself to take up this role at the eleventh hour and even did a great job in spicing up the session for the guests and members. 

All our chapter meetings make me feel:

Individual commitment to a group effort--that is what makes 
our Anchorvale Toastmasters Club Work.

-by Zhaomin Wang

My Experience being an Emcee! Thanks to TM!- by TM Dinesh

I joined the Anchorvale Toastmasters club with one objective in my mind

“To develop confidence good enough to be able to walk onto a stage anytime, and to be able to speak as well engross the crowd.”

I attended a few toastmaster’s meetings and presented few speeches, however I always wanted to try hosting the meeting or an event. I was always eager to take up the ‘Toastmaster of the day’ (TMOD) role, but before I could do that, a better opportunity shook my door.

One day our Club’s President Chee Sian during his opening address, announced that Sengkang West Zone L Resident Committee (RC) needs an Emcee for their Halloween event. I did not blink my eyes and raised my hands of the opportunity at hand.

It was as if half of the battle was won, however varied thoughts started running in my mind and I started having doubts and fear about my decision of agreeing to be the Emcee. The event date was 27^th October and President told me that RC would contact me. Few weeks passed by, however no one contacted me, so I thought I was out of the event. But to my surprise on 22^nd October, I got an email from Mr. Ivan telling that the event was on and I would be required to host the event.

I got only few days to prepare however, I told myself not to take that as an excuse to opt out. I called Chee Sian and asked him for few tips. He referred me to one of our Senior Members of the club Muthu Ganesh. I spoke with Muthu and he gave me some valuable tips. I prepared the script for the event and sent to RC for review.

I asked my son to accompany me for moral support during the event. I dressed up comfortably with an aim to be decently formal at the same time have a hint of party look. I reached the venue one hour early, had a good discussion with the organizer about the setup, games and overall timings for each event, which really helped me to be prepared. At sharp 6:30 PM, I took over the mic and started welcoming the guests. I welcomed the Guest of Honor (GOH) with gusto. I started quite well, voice was clear and I could see a good response from the audience and noticed that they were able to follow my instructions.

I felt that my involvement with the crowd was appreciable and I could manage the crowd well during the games. I felt my lessons from toastmasters coming alive at the event.

My son’s presence helped me a lot. He was encouraging me, helping me as and when needed and took pictures for me.

After the event I felt satisfied with my accomplishment, however there were few areas which I felt could have been better. I felt I could have rehearsed a bit more and I could have been more engaging by asking more questions and cracking more jokes.  I do realize that it was my first emceeing experience and I can use this experience and learnings from toastmasters to do even better next time.

All in all, it was a great experience, a baby step towards the big milestone of becoming a great speaker. I am thankful to our Anchorvale toastmasters club and RC for the wonderful opportunity and here is my small piece of advice for all the club members:

“Whenever you get an opportunity to implement and showcase lessons from toastmasters’ meetings, do grab the opportunity, it will indeed be a very enriching experience for sure!”

-TM Dinesh Aggrawal