My workshops for Toastmaster clubs keep evolving. I ask for feedback and also initiate changes on my own after I see what works. This latest workshop came to me via the lovely Maxine Terry, a member of Toastmasters and recent organizer of our yearly conference. Her club was installing officers and she thought some interactive team building would help as well as adding some fun.
In my opening monologue I’m usually looking for some comedy leverage and found some without too much difficulty. Their new president is male and most of the members are female so I compared this, comedically, to me having three sisters. Easy enough. The laughter got things going but this was a fun group who had no problems making humor on their own as we began the exercises.
The workshop design: Since this club meets once a month and was installing new officers, I wanted to do something to get them talking and learning about each other. I asked them to pair off and find out how many things they had in common with their partner, and whoever had the most, wins!! Making it competitive would hopefully add some speed and energy to their task. It did. The task got everyone talking and served its purpose as an icebreaker.
From there we did a fun game I found on the internet some years ago. Silently pick a person to stay close to and one to stay away from. Begin moving!!! This is always fun due to the futility. The silence of it, except for some vocal exasperations, makes it interesting and the movement is good because it gets people moving and mingling, but not talking. From there we went to something requiring more focus. In a circle you had to change places with someone else without losing your space to someone who was “it” and in the middle. You can’t speak and must communicate with eye contact. This builds teamwork and trust as the group discovered.
We closed the evening with the basics of improv and a role play with a member who wanted to improve their confidence. I wanted her to be as concise as possible, speaking as few words as possible, to maximize her energy and impact her goal of asking someone to do something. This brought up a good discussion on whether my technique was effective. My goal was to show how the basics: avoid questions, keep it short, and don’t negate are really helpful in daily conversation. Step Up meets every 4th Thursday at Hayes Barton Baptist Church.
