A TYPICAL MEETING

At Sutton Coldfield Communicators, we like to think of our meetings as enjoyable social events with a valuable educational spin-off.

Every speakers club has it's own personality and ours favours informality and a slice of good humour.  We have many experienced members from all levels of POWERtalk and we believe we have a very supportive environment that all members can benefit from.

There are some events, such as inter-club speech, debating and writing competitions, where a greater degree of formality is appropriate and we like to enter fully into the spirit of such occasions.

The format of a typical club meeting can vary and we have a theme for each night. The meetings generally include these three main elements covered within a set time frame:

• Business meeting, which serves to illustrate the flow of a formally planned meeting and also updates the members on Club funds and forthcoming events.
  
  
• Two or three prepared speeches of typically 5-8 minutes, which are timed and evaluated so that members can “learn” from their experience. The evaluation is seen as positive feedback permitting members to strive for improvement in their performances.
  
  
• Workshops are prepared and delivered by members to deal with specific techniques and most are interactive learning sessions.  Recent workshops have included: speaking without notes, debating skills, broadening vocabulary, listening skills and projecting your voice.

Most meetings commence at 7.45pm and normally finish at 9.45pm.

As the club is essentially about speaking, all members take turns to perform the meeting’s ‘functionary’ roles that include Programme Presenter, Evaluator, Host and Timekeeper.