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INSIDE
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Club Vision, Club Mission, Who we are
THE POWER TO CONQUER - OVATION 2021
TOASTMASTERS INTERNATIONAL
05_ Editor’s Note
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MEMBERS ACHIEVING REMARKABLE SUCCESS
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SMOOTH SEAS NEVER
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MAKE SKILLFUL SAILORS
DON THE CONFIDENCE CLOAK WITH A TOASTMASTER
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THE WAYS OF LEARNING
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QUIZ CONTEST
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FIGHTING FOR THE TITLE OF THE CHAMPION
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Club Mission
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“We provide a supportive and positive learning experience in which members are empowered to develop communication and leadership skills, resulting in confidence and personal growth”
TOASTMASTERS INTERNATIONAL
Club Vision “Striving towards excellence in public speaking skills whilst creating quality leaders by providing a conducive environment to realise the dreams and hopes of members.”
Who are we Awakening Toastmasters is a community club. We are a diverse group of people, consisting of professionals,doctors, lawyers, IT Specialists, Artists and Entrepreneurs who share the common goal of improving public speaking and leadership skills.
It is with utmost pleasure I share my view on this wonderful newsletter, The Awakener. I would like to thank Muhmmad Sheikh Ahmed, DTM and TM Muhammed Saeed for giving me the wonderful opportunity to be the editor of the official newsletter of Awakening Toastmasters Volume 9, Issue 2. I would also like to express my heartfelt gratitude to the president TM Abdul Qadir, and my team VPPR - TM Zumry Iqbal, TM Nafan Nazeel and TM Shabeer Shaheer. Kudos to all our contributors for providing us wonderful articles making The Awakener a page turner. Fawaz Jainudeen, DTM
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TM Abdul Qadir President
TM Shadrin Sfawan Area Director - C1
TM Mohamed Yusri New Member
TM Najeeb Saheel
TM Nafeel Naleem VP Education - Versatile Toastmasters
TM Hazim Mubarak
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EDITOR’S NOTE
CONTRIBUTOR CORNER
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OVATION 2021
THE POWER TO CONQUER - OVATION 2021 The first thing I remember fondly is seeing Mohammed Qahtani in person. He was greeted and welcomed by many by. Ahamed Hazzim
I was feeling happy and a bit nervous at the same time. It was my first-time attending Ovation. I recalled the quote “When was the last time you did something for the first time.” This was an opportunity to learn, meet distinguished guests and add a special moment to my memories.
The first thing I remember fondly is seeing Mohammed Qahtani in person. He was greeted and welcomed by many. I purchased the book written by him, “The power of words” and got it signed by the champion himself. He was approachable, humble and encouraging.
My club Awakening was recognized with the highest title a Toastmasters Club can achieve, which is the “GOLDEN CLUB AWARD”, which was awarded to Awakening Toastmasters for the 7th consecutive year in addition
to the “EIGHT-80 MEMBERSHIP AWARD”.
I also remember turning into a journalist taking lots of notes while the Keynote Speakers delivered thoughtful lessons on stage. Turning simple experiences into powerful speeches, rethinking internal beliefs, providing the team members with resources and surrounding oneself with better people were some of the key ideas that I took away.
The speech sessions were also mixed with entertainment
sessions so that the audience remained interested throughout. Getting an opportunity to attend Ovation 2021 was a memorable experience and taught me valuable lessons to grow as a person. To celebrate victories and strive for excellence.
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PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
MEMBERS ACHIEVING REMARKABLE SUCCESS..
“Leadership is not about titles, positions, or flow charts. It is about one life influencing another- John C. Maxwell” by. Abdul Qadir
Continuing the vision of thriving to MARS [Members Achieving Remarkable Success] it has been a great journey with many wins and loads of learning for the entire Awakening Family. We not only celebrated wins at Toastmasters but we also ensured to share the moments of all members achievements outside toastmasters. This has been a great initiative which motivated the Awakening family to keep thriving. This year has been a rather challenging one. With the pandemic at play and the volatile economic conditions, we at Awakening had to drive a clear plan to ensure that we retain our members, be active and drive the values of
Toastmasters. We at Awakening were able to start a speech crafter program at Daraz and we’ve conducted a few sessions already. We’ve been receiving extremely good feedback and participation from speech crafters at Daraz. To ensure that the Awakening Toastmasters were active participants we’ve been able to many members participating for each session. We also had many thematic sessions such as Quiz meeting and Games meetings to ensure an overall active participation during all our Awakening educational meetings. With all activities conducted we were able to add new members and reach our base member target in the second half of this year.
The Awakening Exco is geared to deliver the plan that was mapped for the year. We’ve completed 85% of the set targets already without missing any of the initiatives. We’ve got a few more interesting initiatives planned in the next 2 months. We request all members to participate in all sessions. We continue to be extremely grateful to our Charter President DTM Muhammed Sheikh Ahmed and TM Muhammed Saeed for always being there as our mentors, guiding our team with all initiatives that have been executed to date. I would also like to extend my appreciation to the executive committee for the patience and resilience to keep the Awakening flag flying high.
It’s my utmost pleasure in writing this article for Awakener as the Area Director of C1, when I firstly stepped into Toastmasters, being the Chief Editor was my first role and which has given me a lot of insights about Toastmasters. Despite having moments of challenging times yet the clubs of C1 strived to bring out the best standards and quality in their meeting, the pandemic that we had made us stronger and taught us to embrace the challenges and move on in life with great values. We are around the corner in concluding the
year of toastmasters and I firmly believe that all C1 clubs have given their best to raise the bar Wish you all the best for a successful and prosperous future.
The clubs of C1 strived to bring out the best standards and quality in their meeting by. Shadrin Safwan
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SMOOTH SEAS NEVER MAKE SKILLFUL SAILORS
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AREA DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE
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NEW MEMBER
DON THE
CONFIDENCE CLOAK
Looking back from a decade ago at myself, I was someone who really enjoyed the comfort zone. Rarely did I take up any challenges and risks. This also meant that I loved avoiding engagements and competitions. This led to me being described as shy and I being too comfy to get rid of it. But coming to the present and looking back to those days; after joining Toastmasters I am simply amazed that I have been able to shed this dark dress of shyness and donned the cloak of confidence. If you had known the old me, I’m sure that you would vouch for the massive difference in me. Joining Toastmasters has built up my courage and every interaction exude this newfound confidence. As a result, I could share my thoughts very confidently on any social
circle giving value to them. I’m very grateful to my fellow Toastmasters for taking me in as one of them and encouraging me to break the barriers on public speaking with confidence which invariably has laid the foundation for my future success.
“I was someone who really enjoyed the comfort zone. Rarely did I take up any challenges and risks” by. Muhammed Yusri
It was a great privilege to be guided under the captaincy of Muhammad Sheikh Ahamed, and, also two other enthusiastic team members by. Shakir Hussain
At the outset, I would take this opportunity, to profusely thank Muhammad Sheikh Ahamed of Awakening Toastmasters, for offering me an opportunity to take part in the Quiz Competition organized by District 82 as an upcoming Toastmaster. It was a great privilege to be guided under the captaincy of Muhammad Sheikh Ahamed, and, also two other enthusiastic team members, Muhammad Saeed and Najeeb Saheel. It was a great learning experience as a Toastmaster to be. I did gain a great deal of knowledge about Toastmasters although most of the questions were new to me. Yet, the rest of our team did a fantastic job and we became 9th overall. As a son of an existing Toastmaster and also a brother of an existing Toastmaster of Awakening Toastmasters, it has always been my dream to be part of the Toastmasters fraternity and I wish I would be a part of Awakening Toastmasters soon.
BEING A TOASTMASTER How many of you’ll have taken a moment to think the importance of Toastmasters in our lives? Let me respond through my point of view. As an individual who is currently in Pakistan for my higher education, better communication as well as leadership skills are of immense importance. For me to stand up and communicate with the beautiful people here and break through the language barrier, the skills I was able to learn being a Toastmaster comes in handy.
Toastmasters made me able to stand on my own and get engaged with whatever activity it is, let it be either educational or extra-curricular. Being a Toastmaster of Versatile and learning much from the champions at Awakening have made my life flow at ease, with much better performance. I would definitely recommend you to join a Toastmasters Club where ever you are to experience the new aura of energy growing up in you. Log on to Toastmasters International -Find a Club to join from wherever you are. by. Nafeel Naleem
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WITH A TOASTMASTER
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UPCOMING TOASTMASTER
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EDUCATIONAL ARTICLE
THE WAYS OF
LEARNING by. Najeeb Saheel
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Many people recognise that each person prefers different learning styles and techniques. Everyone has a mix of learning styles. Some people may find that they have a dominant style of learning, with for less use of the other styles. Others may find that they use different styles in different circumstances. There is no right mix. Nor are your styles fixed.
You can develop ability in less dominant styles, as well as further develop styles that you already use well. Using multiple learning styles for learning is a relatively new approach. The approach is one that educators have only recently started to recognize. Traditional schooling uses mainly linguistic and logical teaching methods. It also uses a limited range of learning and teaching techniques. Many schools still relay on classroom and book-based teaching, much repetition, and pressure exams for reinforcement and review. A result is that we often label those who use these learning styles and techniques as Bright. Those who use les favoured learning styles often find themselves
in lower classes, with various not-so-complimentary labels and sometimes lower quality teaching. This can create positive and negative spirals that reinforce the belief that one is “smart” or “dumb”. By recognizing and understanding your own learning styles, you can use techniques better suited to you. This improves the speed and quality of your learning. Why learning styles? Your learning styles have more influence than you may realize. Your preferred styles guide the way you learn. They also change the way you internally represent experiences, the way you recall information, and even the words you choose. Research shows us that each learning style uses different parts of the brain. By involving more of the brain during learning, we remember more of what we learn. Researchers using brain-imaging technologies have been able to find out the heat areas of the brain responsible for each learning style.
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Everyone loves to learn. But what kind of styles of learning are most effective for each individual. Surely there is no one-size-fits-all approach to learning. After all we’re seeing a dramatic increase in the number of learning tools made available and they cover an array of learning styles.
QUIZ CONTEST
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THEMED MEETING
Excited and Thrilling is the essence which still reminds of this fascinating event. by. Insaf Ahamed
The 234th Educational Session of Awakening Toastmasters was held on the 8th of January 2022 at the Dehiwala Premises. There were some exhilarating items lined on the day’s agenda. And The Most Anticipated event among them was the Quiz Contest.
5 Teams were drawn to battle against each other with 3 players for each team. And this was the first time that a Quiz Session was held with the aid of an online application named ‘Kahoot’, giving the participants a fresh experience out of the normal.
The Quiz Master for the day TM Abdul Qadir was prepared for an entertaining session with an array of varied questions ranging from Toastmasters History, General Knowledge, Current Affairs and Sports which were tested on a round by round basis. One of the main highlighted points was that the hall was packed with a full house of energetic Toastmasters.
The questions were both read and displayed on the projector screen where the scores were decided and awarded based on both the fastest and the correct answer.
Out of the teams that played, a close battle was witnessed between Team Falcons, Team Sharks and Team Jaguars. However, after a nail-biting contest, Team Sharks eventually was crowned as Champions, Team Jaguars as 1st Runners Up and Team Falcons as 2nd Runners Up.
The awards for the winning teams were distributed and since all the participants were highly engaged and excited on this new experience it was agreed to have more of these types of games in the future meetings as well.
FIGHTING FOR THE TITLE OF
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THE CHAMPION In this contest season the Awakeners contest to be the Champion of public Speaking yet again by. TM Muhammed Saeed
As the months of Feb and March approaches us, all Toastmasters are faced with two Decisions: The renewal of the membership? And whether to contest?
In this contest season the Awakeners contest to be the Champion of public Speaking yet again. The D-Day happened on the 20th of March 2022. With both International Speech Contest and Table Topics Contest Taking place. It was a fresh breath of air with the physical contest returning after sometime of online contests.
Ten brave and enthusiastic Awakeners took part in both with six participants for each contest meaning that two contestants dared to take part in both. The International speeches were filled with rich content ranging from personal story of a stroll in the woods in the night to how to
evaluate and judge an item and from humorous office stories to inspiring words to believe yourself and prove naysayers wrong. Table Topics contest showcased another brilliant performance from the contestants. With the title for the contest beaning ‘Patience is Priceless’, all the contestants took different approach to the topic some kept it Humorous, some made it inspirational, and one contestant made the speech on philosophical level. one contestant made the speech on philosophical level.
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CLUB CONTEST
The Results were as follows for International Speech contest: 1st Place – Rifdhan Rifark 2nd Place – Zumry Iqbal 3rd Place – Insaaf Ahmed The Results were as follows for Table Topics Speech contest: 1st Place – Ahmed Hazim 2nd Place – Akif Uvaim 3rd Place – Safwaan Hussain The winner and the first runners’ up were qualified to take part in the upcoming Area Contest under the Awakening Flag.
MEETING VENUE No, 7/B, Vijitha Road, Nedimala, Dehiwala EVERY SATURDAY 9 A.M ONWARDS WWW.AWAKENINGTM.ORG