Log #5

On April 7^th, my friends and I go to the NTU toastmasters club to take a look at their speeches. It’s located at the seventh floor on the second Student Center in NTU. When registering, I got an agenda and a revolution paper in English. I didn’t know that NTU has the club actually and I was interested in the club schedule including Theme Meeting and Table Topics. The topic is Freshman Cup 2 on that day so I suppose the speakers are all new here in the club. In the room, there were around thirty people and few of them were foreigners.

I would like to divide the thought into five parts, including what I have learned from the judges, speakers and this event. First, I believed the judges were all seniors and one of them were the president of the club. They spoke English really well and the comment on each speech is concrete and inspiring. For example, no matter how the speech is good or not, they would say thank you for doing their best and then give advice. They always encouraged them, complimented them, and congratulated them. The atmosphere they created were so lovely and comfortable even though we all knew that the speakers were so nervous and anxious. That reflects the campus environment in NTU which I like it so much.

Second, what I have learned from the speakers is the importance of eye contact, confidence and smiling. Some of the speakers had their own style of giving a speech, for example, one was elegant one was attractive and one was humorous. I enjoyed each of speech because most of them had an interesting story to share. One Japanese girl even described herself as a product to show everybody who she was. I was surprised to see how good they were in English as non-native speakers and no one majored in English like I did. I like a motto from the speech that says,” Do not hesitate to pursue your dream because there is nothing to lose. Follow your heart.” I am confused and afraid of breaking out of my comfort zone so I must ask myself what I really want to pursue my dream.

          I sincerely believe it’s a good place to develop the skills of giving English speeches on the stage. The skills I have learned from the event are in the following two points. One, catch the audience attention and make them enjoy the speech. In addition to be humorous, remember to make connection to the audience. Sometimes sharing a small thing but does not distract people from the main idea. The other, pause in the right place and pronounce clearly. An Indonesian was shy and had a strong accent that I had a hard time understanding his talk. On the other hand, speakers should speak loudly; using the microphone correctly is also important.