Communication Self-Evaluation

            The biggest surprise from my self-evaluation and how others evaluated me was the fact that my husband scored me higher on communication anxiety.  My co-workers and I scored me as having mild communication anxiety while he scored me as being moderate.  At first I became upset with him because I thought he knew me so well.  Then I realized, it is because he knows me so well that he scored me moderately.  I tell him everything and how I am feeling.  I also ask him advice about situations.  It is through this open communication that he realizes that my anxiety is situational and several situations can cause me anxiety.  When I actually have the communication and conversations I am less anxious and that is what my co-workers see.  I also see that I scored myself based on the actual communication and not the anxiety leading up to some of the situations that causes me these stresses. 

            One insight that I had involves my verbal aggressiveness.  Although I scored moderate, I thought I would score higher.  Like most people I do have thoughts that stay in my head but it is hard for me to keep them there especially during conflict.  Through my scores, it shows that perhaps I do a better job hiding what I mentally think and feel.  Granted most of these mental thoughts are fleeting.  I admit in some situations I just want to look at someone and ask them what they were thinking.  Through these scores, I can work even harder to restrain my thoughts to where I do not even have some of them.  I do realize I am human but if I have too many of these thoughts, it will greatly affect how I communicate with others.  Another reason is if I can keep calm, I can find more gentle ways of talking to people and persuade their thoughts and views.  This is especially helpful in my advocacy work for children and their families.  I also need to work on my verbal aggressiveness when I talk to my providers so I can be a better coach with them.  I want to encourage change not make them do it. 

            Another insight is that I am too trusting of other people.  This has caused me problems in the past because I trusted others with information that they used against me.  I am becoming more aware of this and being guarded with what I tell people and which people I tell it to.  This affects my personal life because I keep the people I have confidence in close to me.  It affects how I interact with other people because I do not want to get hurt.  Professionally, this is good because as a professional, sometimes I need to keep my opinion to myself about situations.  I may disagree with what a co-worker or supervisor says but I should keep these opinions to myself.  If I share it with others, they may go to my supervisor, which could cause problems.  Early childhood professionals often build close relationships with the children and parents that they work with and want what is best for them.  Due to these relationships, sometimes we, as early childhood professionals share opinions that do not need to be shared with parents, such as opinions on the child’s teacher.  I have watched a co-worker do this and I get upset because she is not being professional and has caused problems with my work and the provider.  Keeping this in mind will help me stay and be seen as a professional. 

Cultural Communication

            Although I do my best to communicate with respect, I do find myself communicating differently with different groups.  I see it most when I am with a group of my peers versus a group of my co-workers.  Even when looking at communication with my co-workers, I communicate differently especially if my supervisors are around.  Through this self-reflection, I see how I have differing levels of self-monitoring depending on who is around.  When my supervisors or co-workers are around, I have higher levels of self-monitoring.  I think to be a more effective communicator I need to be a better self-monitor.  I stress out when talking with my supervisors and can obsess over everything that they say or do.  I get caught up in saying the correct things and their reactions that I usually forget important points of the conversation and forget what I originally wanted to talk to them about.  I need to relax more and stress less so I can remember the important points and maintain the focus of the conversations.

            When I am around my peers, I can tend to slip into perceptions based on the group that I am in communication with.  I let their perceptions become my perceptions even though I know better.  This is especially true when talking about cultural myopia and stereotypes.  Thankfully my work in a Cultural Competence Breakthrough Series Collaborative and my last course has really helped me discover who I am, my perceptions, and be a more culturally competent communicator.  When I am around my group of peers I need to be a better culturally competent communicator model and maintain my perceptions instead of following into the group’s perceptions.  Maybe through this modeling, I can start to change the group’s perceptions and create more awareness. 

            Last but not least the idea of being other-oriented and the Platinum Rule made me think about how I handle myself in situations and with communication with others.  I realize that no matter whom I am communicating with, I need to be more aware of how they want to be treated.  I am sometimes so focused on my thoughts, emotions, and perceptions that I forget to think about the other person.  I admit I have left conversations kicking myself after realizing how I treated the other person.  I was not mean or rude, but realized I could have handled situations differently if I took into account their perceptions and how they would have liked to be communicated with.  This was one of the first lessons I learned when I became a supervisor.  I handled communication and a situation with a matter of fact attitude.  That backfired in my face and I came to understand that my team members needed to be communicated with in a more gentle manner and less of a like it or leave it attitude.  Keeping this in mind will help me become a more effective communicator regardless of the group I am communicating with. 

Non-verbal Communication

            For this assignment, I chose to watch an episode of Modern Family because I have never seen this show.  The assignment was tough relying on only the nonverbal cues to figure out relationships and the plot of the show.  I had a feeling based on the name of the show that most of the characters were related in some way.  However, I was unable to pick up on the relationships.  I did not know the main characters were a dad and his adult son and daughter. 

            I was also wrong in my assumptions based on non-verbal behavior in two scenes.  One of the opening scenes I thought one of the guys was upset with the other based on his body language.  It turns out when watching it with sound that the guy was upset with the person on the phone and not his partner.  In another scene, I thought a woman was yelling at another woman on the phone.  Her eyes were big and furrowed.  Her mouth was moving quickly and she was animated with her arms.  It turns out she was not angry with the other woman on the phone.  She was actually giving her advice on how to handle a situation. 

            Through body language, other visual cues and situational contexts, I was able to get a general idea of the plot.  However, I missed out on some background information that aided in the plot.  Since it was a sitcom, I also missed out on the comedy and humor that the show provided. 

            My aha moment and insight I had through this assignment was how much we depend on verbal communication to accompany non-verbal communication.  While watching the show without the volume, I was desperately trying to lip read so I could understand what people were saying.  It was driving me crazy not being able to hear what they were saying.  I also learned I am a very bad lip reader.  It reinforced the idea from our reading that non-verbal communication is not completely accurate.  Also while watching the show muted, I started thinking that this must be what deaf people experience.  All they see is non-verbal communication and try to read lips to get an understanding of what is being said.  I know that most shows can be turned so there are captions for people who cannot hear.  But again, these are words and one cannot understand the tones that are being used with each word.  The tone can affect the meaning behind the word. 

Competent Communicator

            For this assignment, I chose my son’s hockey coach.  I believe that Coach John is a competent communicator both on and off the ice.  When on the ice with the children, he has a “fun” tone to his voice, which keeps the children engaged.  One can hear the excitement and encouragement in his voice when working with the children.  When some of the children are not listening or playing around, Coach John takes a firm voice with them.  He does not yell at them, but the children know they need to stop when Coach John changes his tone.  I would love for some teachers to observe him and notice his tones, words of encouragement, and interactions with the children.  A few could learn how to appropriately interact and talk to children from him. 

            Very importantly, Coach John shows the children what he wants them to do.  This is a very important communication skill especially with children.  As he is talking about the drills he wants the children to run, he is running them at the same time.  This helps both the visual and auditory learners.  If children do not understand, he takes the time to ensure that everyone understands. 

            Parents are constantly asking him how their children are doing and if they are improving.  Coach John has a wonderful way of giving parents constructive criticism.  He always leads and ends with the positives with negatives sandwiched in the middle.  He is kind yet honest when talking about the negatives. 

            I would like to model some of my communication after Coach John.  I believe I could improve my tone of voice from time to time.  As with most people, my tone usually conveys my feelings.  Although I have learned that sometimes I do come across differently and my tone does not match my communication.  Learning from Coach John, I need to ensure my tone matches my communication.  Also within my line of work, I am in the position of delivering praise and criticism.  I know I need to continually improve my delivery of both and to ensure that I sandwich something negative between positives.