55 What's all this about speech contests? (Toastmasters International)
Description
This article is from the Toastmasters International FAQ, by Joel Furr DTM jfurr@danger.com with numerous contributions by others.
55 What's all this about speech contests? (Toastmasters International)
In order to provide for people who enjoy competitive speaking,
and in order to showcase the best, Toastmasters clubs hold
speech contests as many as five times a year. Each contest
starts at the club level and works its way up through Area and
Division to the District. Three contests go on to Regional
and one goes on to the World Convention each August.
The contests are:
* Tall Tales - 3 to 5 minutes in length. A tall tale, which
must be original (you can't use someone else's material).
Goes as far as the District level in most Districts.
* Table Topics - 1 to 2 minutes in length. Impromptu speak-
ing. All contestants are taken out of the room and brought
back in one by one to speak on the *same* topic, which should
be general in nature and not require specialized knowledge
which some contestants might have while others might not.
Since no contestant hears the topic before his turn to speak
on it, you can judge their impromptu speaking abilities by the
way in which each person's effort stacks up against the
others. Goes as far as the District level in most Districts.
* Evaluation - 2 to 3 minutes in length. A target speaker
gives a speech which all the evaluation contestants are to
evaluate. The contestants are taken from the room and given
five minutes to prepare their speeches and make notes. Then,
their notes are taken away and they are brought back into the
room one by one (at which time the contestant gets his notes
back) to deliver their oral evaluation of the target speech.
Since no contestant hears what another said about the target
speech, the judges can compare the analytical abilities of the
contestants. Goes as far as the Regional level in Regions 8;
the other Regions do not have it.
* Humorous speech - 5 to 7 minutes. Humorous speaking, which
must be original. Year after year, people hear the rules read
to them and then stand up and present Bill Cosby routines and
then act puzzled when they're disqualified. It's supposed to
be a *speech*, not a monologue, and it MUST be original. It
should also be "clean." So-called "blue humor" will get you
zero points in the "appropriateness" column of the judges'
forms. In other words, it should be a five-to-seven minute
speech with a lot of humor value, but ALSO displaying good
speechmaking abilities. Goes as far as the Regional level in
most Regions.
* International Speech - 5 to 7 minutes. Any topic at all, so
long as it's original. Can be funny, serious, whatever. It
should be the best speech you can give, and it must be
original. Did I mention that it must be original? Don't do
what so many speakers do and crib at length from someone
else's works and then expect that no one in the audience will
smell a rat. The reason this contest is called "International
Speech" instead of "General Speech" or "Miscellaneous Speech"
is because it's the only one of the five contests that goes as
far as the World level. Each August, winners from the eight
Regions and the Overseas clubs (9 contestants in all) compete
at the World Convention in the World Championship of Public
Speaking.
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