Make Your Success in Toastmaster Evaluation Contests Simple: Use 3 S's: Part 1

The operative word in that title is "SIMPLE". As in uncomplicated.

Success in Evaluation Contests is not "EASY". As in effortless.

If you're going to compete you may want to get familiar with 3 S's: Study, Structure and Simulation.

In this post we'll take a look at the first BIG "S"..........

1. STUDY

You'll go up against other Toastmasters so you'll need to know A LOT about about speaking and speech evaluations. Here are 3 smaller s's to help you along in your STUDIES:

a. sites

Yes, Toastmasters information on delivering evaluations is outstanding. Study all that information and then........

Study some more!

Search for the phrase "Toastmaster Evaluation Contest" on the Internet and discover preparation treasure.

Two of my favorite gems are:

• This series about evaluations on Six Minutes Blog and.....
• An article by an evaluation contest champion from New Zealand

Internalizing and using the content from these two sources will give you a decided edge over your competition.

b. speakers

If you visit Toastmasters International you'll find a list of previous World Champions of Public Speaking.

A number of these speakers have their own websites and offer educational material that will give the knowledge you get in Toastmasters an additional boost.

Another resource I found invaluable is Rory Vaden's 57 Points to a World Championship Speech, which is part of his 6 CD set entitled "The Audience is NOT in their Underwear".

Be sure to invest in your contest success!

c. speeches

Study as many as you can before contest time. Not just in Toastmasters meetings. Check out YouTube. If possible, watch contest speeches too.

• Does your Club, Area, Division or District have a videographer?
• Do you have access to recordings of speeches at some of or each of these levels?
• How about videos of previous Evaluation Contests?

Learn from speeches displaying all levels of skill. Also, be sure to watch speeches delivered by Toastmasters from various countries.

Studying high level contest speeches makes it easier to formulate recommendations for test speakers. Studying speakers from various countries ensures you won't be thrown off if your test speaker has an accent you're not accustomed to. And studying previous Evaluation Contests helps you find ways to stand out with your analysis and delivery.

Well, that wraps up this first post!

Come back to Silver Spring Toastmasters Blog soon where you'll learn how to "Make Success in Evaluation Contests Simple" with the second BIG "S":

SPEECH!