When you are the Table Topics Master…
… you have to make other Powerspeakers talk, talk spontaneously for 1 – 2 minutes about the topic you gave them. This can be totally made up or totally serious. Make them sell an urban tree house or give a choleric speech on the hard life of royals.
Katja Frank, Competent Communicator (more than 10 Speeches)
How i prepare the table topics questions:
1.) I like to prepare a few questions about the same theme.
2.) In order to find a good theme, I think about subjects that everybody can relate to, comment on and talk about!
For example subjects from the yellow press are trival and very good:
Stars, vacations, fashion, royal family, oscar ceremony, movies, weddings…
3.) The next step in preapring your tables topics, is to create a few questions around this subject. It is crucial to give it a good thought, how to formulate the questions.
They can be provocative, humours, inviting, unexpected…
Everything is allowed as long as they are politically correct and spur the audience imagination.
Bad example: Do you like hats?
Good example: Why are hats with pink stripes the thing to wear this summer?
Good example: For whom would you like to design a hat and why?
4.) Avoid “close questions.“ Avoid questions that can be answered with either a single word or a short phrase.
Do the opposite, use “open questions“. Open questions are likely to receive a long answer.
Open questions ask the respondent to think and reflect.
Open questions will give you opinions and feelings.
Open questions hand control of the conversation to the respondent.
That is what you want in your table topic session!!!!
Looking forward to your table topics!
Signed up to be the Table Topics Master at our next meeting? Click here to get some inspiration for your role.