Toastmasters to offer free workshops

PALMER — Do you want to enjoy learning with stimulating people? Palmer Toastmasters Club is sponsoring a series of workshops this winter that will offer Valley residents opportunities to do just that.

The first event in the series was Oct. 26 at the MTA Building in Palmer and was organized by Karen Robinette and fellow members of Palmer Toastmasters Club.

“Workshops can be so boring,” Robinette said. “We wanted to learn how to make learning fun. We did. For example, we learned how to handle difficult people by role-playing. Each person got to be a troublemaker, a trainer and an observer. That was a lot of fun.”

Mike Cox, an experienced trainer and professional storyteller from Anchorage, taught participants how to design interesting, interactive training programs for adults.

He showed the class how to teach every concept with an interactive exercise and make the workshop SMART — specific, measurable, attainable, relevant to the real world and well-timed.

The remaining workshops will be presented January through April 2014. All of them will be open to the public and taught by Toastmasters who participated in the Oct. 26 event. They will cover a variety of topics designed to meet the needs of community members and will be announced locally as each date approaches.

For more information, visit palmer.toastmastersclubs.org.