1.2 Developing your communication skills
Activity 2 Reflecting on your communication skills
Timing: Allow about 30 minutes for this activity.
Think of a recent interaction you have had with someone. (This could be one of the situations you have identified in a previous activity, or another one.)
- Write a short account (maximum 300 words), giving as much detail as you can. At this stage of the activity, don’t worry too much about the communication aspects of your story.
- Once you have finished writing, put it aside for a few moments. This will give you time to think about what you have written.
- Now return to your account and identify any communication skills that you can see in your interaction with the other person. (You may wish to refer back to the six example communication skills given at the beginning of this section.)
Activity 3 What your communication skills say about you
Timing: Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.
In the table below, write examples where your own communication skills (effective or not) have revealed something about you to the person you were communicating with. The first example is how Karen (the OU student already mentioned) might have completed the table.
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Discussion
Our communication skills, or lack of them, can have more effect than we might think. Reflecting on what you reveal about yourself can allow you to become a more effective communicator. In Karen’s case, improving one communication skill had the knock-on effect of improving another.