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I was the table topics master of a Toastmaster club near my home. I prepared the table topics; however, I could not find the sheet of paper with all my ideas. I have to do the table topics all from my mind.
Table topics session is the funnest and most challenging part of a Toastmaster meeting. It has the widest participation, almost everyone need to go to the podium to give a table topic. It is one to two minutes improptu speech. Once you have the qeustion or topic from the table topics master, you have to response quickly, think on your feet.
The theme of the table topics I prepared is Energy and Environment. I have been working on this subject for many years and I am very familiar with this topic. Even though I lost my notes, I could present the table topic very well. I felt that I did a real good job yesterday. I stuttered during the presentation; however, I really feel that the stutter does not have much negative affect on my communication skills. I gave a little background of the alternative energy resource of each, and then I asked club member to present his/her view of the problem. It was a very hard problem for most of them because they are not in science and technology area. I rephrased the topic to everyday life so they can relate to. We discussed oil, coal, biomass, hydro electric, solar, wind and nuclear energy. Besides the alternative resources, we also discussed about the impact on environment of the using of fossil fuels. Human being has lived on the earth for thousands of years. We lived with our nature harmonically and in a self-consistent way before industrial revolution. After industriallization, we started to exploit our natural resources. We have used up more than half of the fossil fuels during last two hundred years. Now we are heavily rely on the fossil fuels. The US import 10 million barrels of oil per day. The oil price sored over $80/bbl in last week. We should develop a strategy to solve this problem. The most prominent solution is go for renewables and nuclear.
We also talked about impact of energy conservation, such as recyling of recyclables. Jene who is from Japan talked about the sophisticated recyling system of Japan. We talked about how to save energy in our homes. We also talked about global warming issues. I was told that the table topics were challenging, but they like it.
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