Can British Prime Ministers still learn from Aristotle and rhetoric? Aristotle is important to us as speakers because he is generally credited as developing the basics of rhetorical theory in his book, which is often translated into English as The Art of Rhetoric.

Britain now has a new Tory Prime Minister. As a note for anyone outside the U.K., Tory is the nickname for the Conservative Party. I don’t want to talk about the advantages and disadvantages of the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition, I’m specifically interested in the new Prime Minister’s speaking ability. Read the rest of this entry

I wanted to write about my experiences of Toastmasters in the U.S. compared with my experiences with it in the U.K. While the main focus will be geared towards fellow Toastmasters, I will try provide useful information for the non-member too.

The great thing about Toastmasters is that essentially you can pretty much go to any meeting around the world and find like-minded people. Not only that, but there is also a lot of familiarity as the vast majority of roles are the same. So if you do go to a Toastmasters event in another city or country, like I did, then there is a sense of comfort in that public speaking culture. Read the rest of this entry

The Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking for 2009 is Australian Mark Hunter, with his speech “A sink for a green tomato”. In seems that previously, Mark competed in the 2001 World Championships which has since produced 2003 winner Jim Key. Beyond the accolades, having previously competed in the early rounds of the contest myself the contest is a good way to expand and improve your skills on the area of public speaking.

If you’re not too wedded to winning awards, then progessing your learning curve through taking part can be immense. Here’s an article I previously wrote on the subject, when I competed in the contest in 2008 -  How to win a speech contest even if you lose.

Here’s a post about the 3rd project in the Humorously Speaking manual. The first video in this series is viewable here Humorously Speaking 1. and the 2nd post is here. There’s more to creating humour than just comedy writing techniques; this video goes “beyond the rule of three”.

As I’ve said before, if you want to learn to be humorous, this video is can help you add humour to your presentations whether you’re a member of Toastmasters International or not. This clip is 18 mins long, so you may want to set aside some time to watch it. Read the rest of this entry

Here’s a post about the 2nd project in the Humorously Speaking manual. The first video in this series is viewable here Humorously Speaking 1. This video is especially useful if you’re considering doing the Humorously Speaking Manual. Remember also, that the Humorous Speech Contest comes up once a year.

This vid is also a good way to introduce hmour to your speeches and presentations. If you need funny introduction, or maybe a funny story to end with, have a butcher’s… Read the rest of this entry