EDUCATIONAL COMMUNICATION

The scientific methodological work

Profesor Jianu Camelia

Colegiul Tehnic Reșița, Caraș-Severin

            Communication is essential to the personal and social life of an individual, and cannot exist without communication in a community; it is in the nature of people that when they meet to exchange ideas, to communicate. Without communication people lose interest in joint activities . One’s company is established and maintained through numerous processes and communication networks.

            Communication is ubiquitous in various forms: interaction, relationship, sharing, influence and control; because all social processes involve a form or another of communication. For this reason the school which involves multiple social relationships, and the way in which we communicate can contribute significantly to student success, so the role of communication in education must be an ongoing concern of the teacher.

Keywords: communication, didactical communication, educational communication

I. The concept of communication

         A universal and all-encompassing concept of communication can not be compressed into a single definition. The concept of communication can have multiple meanings:

         - verbal exchange of thoughts and ideas;

         - interaction;

         - transfer, exchange and sharing;

      - process of transmitting information, ideas, emotions and skills through the use of symbols (words, pictures, figures, diagrams);

         - transmitting information from a source to a receiver;

     - process by which a source transmits a message to a receiver is intended to influence subsequent behavior.

          Communication is a social binder, it unites people and employs them in action, contributing to the foundation and development of society, the development and maintenance of social relationships.

           In terms of defining the notion of communication, some authors greatly expand the concept, meaning any exchange communication that takes place between two or more individuals or groups , and other authors narrow the much disallowed communication sphere, excluding forms of communication based on nonverbal means.

Whatever the definition, communication was and is treated as a fundamental element of human existence. Summarizing, we can say that communication is to know, to act, to create, to exist.

II . Communication Training

          Communication contains a great educational potential which translates to the transmission of knowledge, the self-regulation of intellectual activity. Between communication and education there is a close relationship of interdependence.

          Communication teaching designates "all activities of transmission and reception of messages whose content concerns learning, training and development of knowledge, skills and abilities in training and schooling."

          Communication training is a particular form of educational or pedagogical communication, considered itself a specialized form of interpersonal communication, a dynamic, complex and interactive. The purpose of communication is to train teachers through organizing teaching beliefs and convictions by choosing those methods favorable training on all areas of human cognition and practice.

          In communication teaching, all elements of the system are being worked on. The didactic communication has the following characteristics: it is based on normative documents (curriculum) and school (planning calendar, didactical project); is conducted in an organized, teaching principles in specialized institutions; transmitter/teacher has special training and skills certification; teachers in constructing messages to the peculiarities of individual students' age and social environment in which they live, and the use of a common repertoire of meanings and meanings of terms; is a deliberate act to amend cognitive, affective, behavioral actionable pupils; requires an assessment feedback in terms of efficiency.

          The qualities of didactical communication depends on many factors: training and communication strategies used, the style of teaching and learning, the personalities of the teacher and student and their management.

           In organizing and conducting educational communication, following steps are involved: establishing and defining objectives; selecting meaningful information or knowledge to be transmitted; correlation with students' previous experiences to facilitate the integration of new knowledge into pre-existing baggage; ordering information transmitted from simple to complex, inductive and deductive; use of resources and teaching materials appropriate to the understanding of the knowledge transmitted, evaluating the effectiveness of communication.

       "Education involves a combination of influences, deliberate action, expressed or implied, systematic or unsystematic, which in some way contributes to an individual's personality" (Salavastru , 2004). It can be said that the didactical communication is also an educational communication, in the sense that the teacher also produces, through his influence, also produces changes in the personalities of students, but it can not be stated that any educational communication is a didactical one, because we are subject to educational influences through the whole course of our lives, while we experience didactical ones only in certain periods of our lives.

III . Ways to overcome bottlenecks in communication

           In teaching, communication is the foundation of the educational relationship. Although it might seem that this communication should perform well (organized group, attitudinal intellectual levels of similar interests, activities performed by authorized and competent people), in reality, communication is encumbered by numerous obstacles.

           Within communication, each participant engages with the whole personality, value system, interests and motivations.

           At the beginning of each school year we ask: "What does the student await from us, teachers?". I realized that he/she awaits very much. He awaits that we are kind and gentle to them, that we treat them like grown-ups and that we are close to them. In the teacher-student relationship the problem of authority remains open. Teacher authority is natural, necessary and has favorable effects in terms of communication, but "authority" does not mean "domineering spirit," "sarcasm" or "irony".

          In communication teaching we should be concise, precise and expressive at the same time to facilitate the transfer, but also for understanding the message conveyed. All the information you send must be adapted to the purpose and objectives of teaching and the intellectual level of the students. The teacher must, however, know how to listen. Students know when their communication partner is only faking to listen and then refuse to communicate. In the communication relationship, the teacher should create a favorable situation where the student does not feel judged or manipulated by questions. Knowing how to listen is a science. Even though some people give the impression of listening,  all their body language shows that in fact the information does not reach them. Lack of communication results from the absence of a real listening party. Lack of obedience may be due to a lack of interest from the other party to the message sender.

          In thematic teaching, the teacher designs learning goals promoted by the core curriculum around a theme, and students choose or propose their own topics of study. This leads to the childrens increased interest for the studied topics and for the message sent.

           The role of the teacher is very important because he/she is the official person from society and through the active-participative teaching methods used in the activities taking place in the classroom and through extracurricular activities, or even perhaps through professional and moral duty, helps language impaired pupils, if possible, to total correction (customized intervention plan , recommended by a speech therapist ), and others to beautify and enrich their vocabulary at a high level, a level that will be a springboard to success in life.

            All the subjects that the student is studying at school contribute to communication development. Mathematics integrates mathematical language in ordinary language and in everyday life , giving the possibility of understanding and producing texts that use code and mathematical language, and mandates students to verbally describe mathematical reasoning. The action of communication-perturbatory factors can be diminished through the integration in mathematics classes (or any other discipline) of short moments which relax, which seem like games, but with specific content relevant to this discipline. In other words, unconventional exercises will awaken the interest for novelty with the desired ending.

            The products of teacher’s creativity can increase the efficiency of instrumental communication, having positive effects of the transmission and retention of knowledge.

          Expressing feelings is essential in every relationship. A reason that causes difficulties in communication is represented by the inability of recognizing and expressing of emotions, from fear of self-disclosure. Here are several ways to improve emotional expression: discuss, challenge and counter the myths about emotion; identifying and recognizing different types of emotions, identifying events or situations that trigger emotion; identifying behavioral ways of expressing emotion; expressing emotions through appropriate language; expression of what you feel.

          Application of active-participatory methods have led to facilitating expression: diamond method, cluster method, tree ideas etc. Collaborative and cooperative teaching methods are methods in which children worked together in pairs or small groups, have learned to work as a team, and have communicated directly face to face. In this method , students share their ideas , help each other to understand and find solutions, stand side by side, explain what they know, discuss together every aspect of the topic that they have to tackle. Children’s communication is a natural way for them to learn new things from each other. Another way to improve communication is the language of responsibility-a form of communication that expresses your own opinions and feelings without attacking your interlocutor. This form of communication is one way to avoid criticism or labeling, by focusing the conversation on the behavior, not the person.

            In order to improve didactical communication, it is mandatory to know and apply some rules, among which we mention:

- speaking fair, open and direct (which prevents or reduces distortion of the message);

- encouraging feedback from students (to know to what extent the messages sent was properly received and understood);

- listening careful , patient and encouraging messages received from the students, along with an effort to understand the exact meaning of these messages;

- using multiple forms of didactical teaching for the same type of messages (usually oral and visual simultaneously);

- complex - repeating messages.

 Conclusions

By paying more attention to the communication relationships between us, really listening to the interlocutor, receiving what is communicated to us and collaborating we can create, on a familial, group or workplace a better world.

It is important that the teacher  doesn’t forget in didactical communication that “not all what is said can be heard, not all what is heard is understood, and what is understood does not depend on us” (L. Soitu)

References:

1.      Pîinisoara, Ion Ovidiu, ”Comunicarea eficientă”, Editura Polirom, Iași, 2003

2.      Salavastru, D. “Psihologia educației”, Editura Polirom, Iași, 2004

Soitu,  L “Pedagogia comunicării”, Editura Didactică și Pedagogică Iași, 2001