This session of Teaching is Communication welcomed three teachers from Finland and Belgium. They were all very intent on learning more about communication and how to improve their communicative skills in their classrooms.
We understand, as teachers, that excellent communicative skills are essential and necessary if we want to transmit knowledge and at the same time reach our students in that authentic way that may affect them all through their lives.
Good communicative skills begin with being good listeners and having that ability to ‘read between the lines.’ Being empathetic to students’ needs is vital to obtaining the right teacher-student relationship as is giving the necessary feedback, good or bad, what be it. Many activities were discussed in how we can encourage communication in the classroom, even trying out a few: guess, the object, role-playing, show ’n tell were much appreciated.
The concept of what a teacher was and how his, her role has changed due to technological advancements has also changed our way of communicating. The teacher today is not only held to convey or transmit information. He or she is called to facilitate, to monitor, to suggest, to tutor students. Let’s face it! Information today is at everyone’s fingertips. It is the teacher’s role to help students understand what is true and what is fake news: the ability to filter information before it becomes information overload.
It is here that the teacher must have not only good but great communicative skills. That teacher who is able to get across exactly what he she intends is not always so clear cut. It primarily needs excellent expertise in his, her own subject area but at the same time, that underlying ability in anticipating the questions that students might arise. Questioning them, probing them, making them think for themselves are all qualities of today’s and tomorrow’s teachers.
The different types of nonverbal communication were also a point of interest. These include body language, the use of chromatics, voice pitch and intonation, the use of artifacts, proxemics ‘all talk louder than words’.
When of course, communication does not occur or the intended message is not received as intended, here we have created a communication breakdown. The different physical, psychological, cultural, barriers and possible solutions to this phenomenon was also considered.
In conclusion, this topic of discussion is always vital, not only in our field of work, but in our daily lives because the need to have positive and effective communication is something that we are and will always be striving for.
Written by
Teresa Platì - JUMP Trainer
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