Communication Evaluation

Communication Evaluation

For my blog this week, I decided to share a portion of my Assignment 1.  I chose two other individuals to evaluate me using the same three assessments.  These people included a family member and friend/colleague.  I found it interesting that the scores fell in the same moderate range on the Verbal Aggressiveness Scale and Communication Anxiety Inventory.  However, these individuals evaluated me at an elevated level range (Rubin, Rubin, Graham, Perse, & Seibold, 2009).  This inventory indicates I feel uncomfortable with anxiety in several communication contexts.  I appreciated learning about myself through others.  I believe they were able to give impartial feedback.  I may have answered some of the questions in a way I hoped I acted as a communicator.  These outside evaluations saw me in a deeper light. 

It has taken me years to grow as a communicator.  As a child and young adult, I was extremely shy and avoided positive or negative confrontations at all costs.  As life progressed, I had to learn to communicate with others in college and in the business sector.  When I returned to school to obtain my educational degree, I realized how important it was to learn to deal with children, families, and colleagues.  I started to understand it was alright to talk with others and even have different opinions.  From my personal evaluation and the feedback from others, I have noticed that I still deal with communication issues.  Even though I am able to speak to large groups, I am still very uncomfortable and try to avoid these opportunities.  I do better in small groups; however, I still desire approval and want people to feel comfortable and get along.  On the other hand, with maturity comes wisdom.  When a topic deals with the needs of my students, my own child, my family, or close friends, I seem to rise to the occasion.  I feel strong, opinionated, and strive to make things right.  I don’t hesitate to stand-up for others or issues that are important to me. 

Through these evaluations, I have considered three goals to help improve my communication skills.  I need to work on my self-esteem, self-adequacy, and stereotyping of others.  My self-esteem may led to a set of attitudes that people hold about their own emotions, thoughts, abilities, skills, behavior, and beliefs that fluctuate according to a situation or context (O’Hair & Wiemann, 2012).  My self-adequacy could lead me to think my communication performances may not be stellar, but just good enough (O’Hair & Wiemann, 2012).  I want to learn to feel more confident and self-assured.  Finally, I need to work on stereotyping individuals on first impressions.   Stereotyping becomes an act of fitting individuals into an existing schema without adjusting the schema appropriately; it involves organizing information about groups of people into categories so that you can generalize about their behaviors, attitudes, skills, morals, and habits (O’Hair & Wiemann, 2012).  I would like to say that I am not guilty of stereotyping my students, their families, or other individuals.  However, I try my best not to assume certain information about others.  Unfortunately, my background knowledge and particular beliefs may interfere with my flexibility and open-mindedness.  Sometimes I meet a child before they are in my classroom.  I may form an inaccurate first impression of that future student.  I have to be willing to set that initial meeting aside and truly get to know this child.  In the past, I have found that my thoughts on these encounters are often inaccurate.

In conclusion, I must work on these goals to become a better educator and communicator.  I want to be a teacher that advocates for her students and educational community.  I must be self-assured and enhance my communication skills to be proficient personally and professionally within the early childhood field.  This will help me interact with young children, their families, colleagues, and various community and government organizations and agencies.  With each new assignment, I learn more about myself and the issues I need to improve upon.  I appreciate this opportunity. 

   

References

O’Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012).  Real communication:  an introduction.

Perceiving the self and others.  Chapter 2, pp. 46-62.  New York:  Bedford/St. Martin’s.

Rubin, R. B., Palmgreen, P., & Sypher, H. E. (Eds.) (2009). Communication research measures: A sourcebook.  New York: Routledge.

Rubin, R. B., Rubin, A. M., Graham, E. E., Perse, E. M., & Seibold, D. R. (Eds.) (2009). Communication research measures II: A sourcebook. New York: Routledge.

Communicating Differently with People from other Groups and Cultures

Communicating Differently with People from other Groups and Cultures

            Upon reflection, I have realized that I communicate differently with people from various groups and cultures.  I believe this may be true with many people; especially, if we have an awareness of these groups.  I find myself interacting with children in stores, restaurants, and my classroom in my “teacher mode”.  Communication becomes more formal in certain situations with colleagues and community leaders in positions of authority.  I try to form a comfortable bond with my children and parents.  They need to feel they can interact with me on a more equal level.  I never want them to feel uneasy or intimated to approach me.  The way I interact with professional colleagues may differ from the way I interact with my Church family to some extent.  However, I hope my Christian values show through in every situation.   We need to acquire background knowledge in order to communicate with diverse cultures.  It takes time and dedication to become an effective communicator.  A competent communicator has knowledge of others, becomes motivated to enhance the quality of communication, and possess the skills of being other-oriented (Beebe, Beebe, & Redmond, 2011).

References

Beebe, S. A., Beebe, S. J., & Redmond, M. V. (2011).  Interpersonal communication:

            relating to others.  6^th Edition.  Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.  Interpersonal

            communication and diversity:  adapting to others.  Chapter 4, pp. 85-114.

Reviewing Communication Styles on a Television Episode

Reviewing Communication Styles on a Television Episode

            I observed an episode of “Bones”.  After watching the episode, I reviewed the premise of this program on the internet.  It stated that this was a crime comedy-drama that involves a forensic anthropologist, Dr. “Bones” Brennan (female character) and a FBI Special Agent Booth (male character) solving Federal legal cases by examining human remains of possible murder victims.

            While watching the episode without sound, these characters appeared to professional associates.   It was obviously a crime drama that dealt with skeletal remains. The female character (Dr. Brennan) showed very little emotion through her facial expressions.  She seemed serious most of the time.  Her demeanor appeared focused on the task at hand and a bit unsocial.  On the other hand, the male character (Agent Booth) had happy or funny facial expressions at times and very serious other times.  His demeanor seemed much more relaxed and engaged with those around him.  At times, I thought that maybe these characters did not necessarily like working together.  She would look at him as if he did not know what he was talking about.  He did not seemed bothered by her straight forward attitude.

            Reviewing the episode with sound was very interesting.  I was basically correct about their personalities.  However, these two characters were actually a couple and co-workers.  They were even expecting a baby.  I did not see that coming from watching their communication behaviors for most of the episode.  This show characterized that opposite personalities obviously attract.  It also had some funny moments within this serious topic.

            In conclusion, this experience expressed that one should not judge a person by their actions alone.  My “aha” moment reminds me that I need to use the appropriate verbal, non-verbal, and listening skills when communicating with others.

Competent Communicator!

Competent Communicator

     I selected the Superintendent of my school district as a person that demonstrates competent communication skills within a situational context.  This will be his third year in this position.  He is very articulate and has a wealth of knowledge of the educational system.  He makes himself available and present at each school as much as possible.  As educational or political issues arise in connection to teachers, he meets with each school personally.  He has the ability to give very intensive information in a user-friendly manner.  His outlook is always positive.  Even when the message may not be positive or helpful for teachers, he understands and allows us to share our opinions.  His responses are informative and heartfelt.  He appreciates our feelings and reassures us that he has confidence in our abilities.  In stressful situations, he reminds us that we are not alone – we are a team.  He supports and fights for the rights of children and teachers.  He receives respect in his position; however, he makes himself very accessible to the children, teachers, staff, and the community.  Our school district has been very blessed!