How do we communicate?

Hey,

When you look at communication you first look at the barriers of communication which are: Psychological (biases/stereotypes), Sematic (language/culture differences), Environment (room size, layout of furniture, noise, heating, lighting), Demographic (gender & age), Disability (physical, neurological & learning) and Organisational (established lines of communication).

Then take a look at the many different ways we have to communicate, both verbal and non-verbal. Some examples are: Pictional, written, music, facial expressions, gestures, emoji and antinational. As a trainee teacher you need to know different ways of communication so that if your method of communication isn’t reaching the children you change it and use a different method.

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) professor, Albert Mehrabian, looked at the 7% - 38% - 55% Rule and developed it within non-verbal forms of communication. He determined that messages received in communication are actually mostly received in a non-verbal form.

• 55% of communication is body language

• 38% of communication is the tone of voice

• 7% of communication is the words from your mouth.

Now let’s look at listening actively which is a way of listening and responding to another person which improves mutual understanding.

“In some ways, active listening is characterised more by what is not done, than what is done. This is because real active listening requires the listener to avoid common responses when listening, even internally, and these are very difficult habits to break.” Robertson, K (2005)

I will leave you with that quote to think about.

Any comments or questions please use the contact box or comment below

Hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading

Amy x

 Medway, S (Plymouth University Lecture)