Communication Perception

As I began this week, I thought my communication skills would not surprise me. However, I was wrong. While myself, my mom, and a colleague rated my verbal aggressiveness and listening style in the same manner, each of us rated my anxiety about communication differently. I myself scored in the moderate range, while mom scored me in the mild range, and my co-worker scored me in the low range. I believe this could be because the only place my colleague sees me communicate is at work whereas my mom has seen me communicate in various places. It gives me comfort to know that my colleague has faith in my communication ability on a professional level. My mom, who has seen me in professional and personal situations, knows I will communicate and make my point when necessary. Through this exercise, I have learned that, especially based on the perceptions of others, that I may be more comfortable communicating than I give myself credit for at times. It has also made me more aware of areas in which I hope to improve.

Intercultural Communication

I have to admit that yes I communicate differently with people of other cultures, especially those who speak a different language. I often find myself speaking slower, drawing pictures with my hands to attempt to assist the other person I am speaking with to better understand. I know from past experience working with families whose primary language was Spanish , however, that they often understand us better than they can communicate with us. Using one of the resources this week, I would like to be more mindful and thus take more time to get to know the background of the family. I also like the idea of 'creating a third culture' which the common ground would be the child in my classroom giving us a 'bridge' between my culture and theirs. Finally, I would like to become more creatively flexible which may be easier said than done. As I continue on this educational journey and this course on communication, my goal is, as is in any other course I have taken, to learn more to become more effective both inside my classroom as well as outside my classroom.

Beebe, S. A., Beebe, S. J., & Redmond, M. V. (2011). Interpersonal communication: Relating to others (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Sound Off

As I completed this assignment I have to admit it was a struggle. I have the shows I like and watch and the shows that don't interest me. With the way my cable is set up I was unable to record a show but I have something called on demand which allows me to watch episodes of shows repeatedly. So I began to complete the task for this blog, watching an episode of Cougar Town.

As I was watching I could not get over that in almost every scene there were glasses of wine. As one who does not drink this caught my eye. Additionally, the facial expressions at times said serious, agitated, happy, no expression gave me a feeling of disinterest. As I proceeded to continue watching I realized that I was also reading lips and with the words I was catching, I figured out what was taking place in the episode. There was a house for sale and a couple interested in buying the house and the group reflected back to when the character Courtney Cox played first moved into the neighborhood. However, I was not completely correct in all aspects of the plot, I thought the girl stretching was getting ready to work out, so watching it a second time with the sound on filled in the blanks and corrected my interpretation mistakes.

I also watched, to compare for myself, a show, The Big Bang Theory, I am familar with without the sound. What I found in doing this is for someone unfamiliar with the show, it could be interpreted as a serious show. However, it is a comedy and I find it to be hilarious. For me the serious facial expressions combined with what is spoken makes it even funnier because the spoken language is not meant to be funny but to the audience it is.

What I learned from this is how important the verbal communication when combined with the nonverbal communication can be. When I watched the show I was unfamilar with had I not been able to read lips, I would have had a completely incorrect interpretation of the show. The same could be said for the show I have watched, if I did not know it was a comedy, the scenes and seriousness of facial expressions are misleading. Nonverbal communication alone can provide one interpretation while verbal communication can provide another, but when combined together with the use of listening skills a complete picture is created.

Competent Communication

As I thought about the question for this week, I could not help but think of my dad. He is in the education field in regard to transportation and food service. We have had many conversations over the years, especially since I have begun teaching about having to be 'politically correct.' My dad does a nice job at being 'politically correct,' professional, and effective when communicating with colleagues, families, board members, and community members. I have learned a lot from him about removing emotion and opinion when communicating on a professional level. However, it is not always something I am able to do.

I hope that through this course and the experiences my dad has shared that I can learn how to better communicate with others so that I may become an effective communicator as I advocate for the earlcy childhood field.