Communicating Differently

I find that as I become more and more involved with people from various background, I try to become more conscientious of the things I say and how I phrase things.  I try to be careful how I ask questions as I assess parents to find their needs for our program.  I pay more attention to facial expressions and body language than I use to and try not to jump to conclusions when they answer questions but get them to expand on their answers.

One strategy I would use to help me communicate more effectively is self reflection.  This give me a chance to think about how I react to people and why this reactions are taking place.  It also helps me to get feedback from coworkers on how I communicate with them so that I can better communicate with the families that we serve.

Another strategy is looking at the source of my communication behavior.  This has helped me examine where I learned to communicate and figure out why I am not as effective as I would like to be.  The habits that I have formed over the years, until about 3 years ago, have made me introverted.  I have always been self conscious about speaking with others who are not familiar with me and found it hard to talk to others because I was not comfortable with myself.   This was the source of my withdrawl from others.  I am learning to be more open and expressive to others I come in contact with and have noticed that others really respond positively to that. 

A third stragegy is learning about diversity, so that I don't jump to any conclusions.  I try to be sensitive to those I do not know anything else about and learn as much as I can by repeating what I thought I heard for clarity, validating strong emotions and efforts that parents and caretakers make positively for their families, and praising the work that they do put in.  The praise is really hard to do with adults, at least for me, because I never had that growing up.  It is easy to praise the little steps that children take because they are learning and growing, but subconsciously I think that adults should have it all together.  I am learning because we think that adults should have it all together, we take for granted that they are struggling just like the children they are trying so hard to raise. 

Communication

Watching Private Practice with the sound turned off made me really focus on the characters' facial expressions and body language.  Without hearing the words, some of the characters seem really hostile towards each other.  One character had her mouth drawn when speaking with another character indicatinng to me that she did not like what he was saying and then with another character she appeared as if she was about to cry.  But when I turned the sound on, she was really interested in the guy she was talking to and ended up kissing him.  So her body language was a little confusing.  It was difficult trying to interpret what they really meant or determine the plot because it was so emotional.  It made me think about what type of communicator I am.  I am not good at noticing body language and this assignment helped me to focus more what the characters were not saying. 

Since I started facilitating parenting groups, I have noticed that I do not read people very well.  This assignment helped me see that I need to practice and focus more on the things people are not saying.  Nonverbal communication is just as powerful a verbal communication, and it's those suttle things that I did not pay attention to before that I know I need more work with.  The nonverbal codes that people use during cocmmunication are very important to decipher.