Communication Skills (1)

Communication Skills (1)                 2010

          Communication, either oral or written, is a two-way process in exchanging, giving or receiving ideas, information or opinions.   We communicate for different purposes.  In our daily conversation for social purposes, we communicate with family members, relatives and friends when we want to know one another better, have social contact, establish closer relationship and the like.   We give / receive instructions in order to get the things done.  We may make requests or inquiry.  We also need to communicate with others in different transactional activities. 

There are 4 basic skills in a language, namely, listening, speaking, reading and writing.  The basic elements of these  4 skills are more / less the same though the activities of these 4 skills may be different. 

Listening and speaking are common activities for most of the people and we often take these activities for granted.  As a listener, you have to know how the speaker present his points in order to understand him / her  well and in response his verbal and non-verbal message.  On the other hand, as a speaker, you should also think of ways to get your message across and be understood.

         

Listening skills

Now let’s explore the skills on how to listen well and understand the message transmitted. The following approaches we may adopt to listen well as we know that listening is an active thinking process to understand the audio message.  Hence when we listen,  we listen for / to:

1   main ideas and supporting details

2.  sequence the main points

3.  infer

4.  compare and contrast

5.  determine the cause and effect

1.    Main ideas and supporting details

Main / general ideas are the most important information that the listener wants to know most.  The rest are the supporting details when the speaker gives examples or other details in the form of facts and illustrations to explain the main / general ideas so that the listener can understand the text better and faster.  The supporting details may come before or after the main ideas.

2.    Sequence the main points

A speaker may arrange the main ideas in sequence based on measures, steps and time.   He may relate the events according to the time of the happening or in chronological order.  A speaker may relate the event in sequential order from one point to another in sequences of priorities / steps of doing something.

     Words to express Time and Sequence

     after    afterwards   before     by     during      eventually     finally    first

     formerly       from ….to…….        in       last     later     long ago     next

     now    past    present(ly)    recently       soon   then     today     till / until

     while

3.    Inference

Sometimes  a speaker may relate something without mentioning that particular thing at all.  But from the hints / clues of the speech,  the listener can conclude what he / she can understand.  For example, 

           Tom says he has to wash his shoes every one or two days. 

As a listener, you can infer that he has cloth shoes and they get dirty easily and he has to wash them every one / two days.  You may also infer that he may only have two pairs of cloth shoes.

4.    Compare and contrast

As a listener, you may listen to how the speaker compares to show the similarities and differences of two things or concepts.  When he contrast, that means he only wants to show the distinct differences, for example, black and white which is an obvious contrast. 

5.    Determine the cause and effect

Look, a speaker may relate the cause and effect of the event / incident.  Therefore, a good listener  has to identity the cause and effect so as to understand the audio message well.

    

Listen and Predict

          As a listener, you may listen and predict / anticipate what the speaker is going to say next.   You may think about what you already know and relate to what you are listening at the moment.  Prediction is easy when we know the context of the communication. 

          The 3 main conditions that make prediction possible by a listener. 

---  widely used idioms, proverbs, quotations and clichés. 

--- stresses on a particular word in the first  part of an utterance. 

          --- the logical connection between the first part and the second

Listen and Summarise

          With the knowledge on what and how to listen for information,  you can group the information under one particular idea known as summarising.  You may use a phrase / a sentence to sum up a passage and even  a paragraph to represent the whole text.  When you summarise, you only consider the main points and leave out the supporting details.

Listening process

          As we know listening is an active process which requires effort and skill.  Listening process involves both attentive and critical listening.  In order to comprehend and remember what the speaker is saying, a listener requires attentive listening.  Besides the listener may ask related questions for clarification.  Generally, attentive listening involves 3 basic skills:

         

          ---  attending skills  -- a posture of involvement |  appropriate body gestures | eye

                                          contact

          --- following skills   --  minimal encouragement | infrequent questions | attentive

                                           silence

          ---  reflecting skills   --  paraphrasing | reflecting meaning | summative reflection

 

Critical listening, on the other hand, not only includes attentive listening but also evaluates and analyses what is heard.  The listener asks probing and challenging questions before he / she makes judgement.  In short, critical listening involves analysis, critical thinking and judgement.  Hence, to listen critically, a listener requires to master critical thinking skills and critical listening skills.

Critical thinking skills involve:

---  asking challenging questions

--- recognising the differences between opinions and facts

---  what you think and reasons with proofs

          ---  objective point of view

          Critical listening skills involves:

          ---  Preview and review

               >> Preview

                     predict / anticipate what the speaker is going to say next, to relate to and

                     how the argument will be developed

                   

               >>  review 

 what issues have been covered

          ---  Mapping as we listen

               >>  the purpose         

               >>  identify the main points

               >>  assess the adequacy of the main points

               >>  the connection of ideas

Listener’s perception of speaker

Aristotle’s view      

          Aristotle (Greek philosopher) proposed that in critical listening, the listener’s  knowledge of the speaker is as important.  Thus in critical listening, the listener has to know the 3 aspects of the speaker:  ethos (speaker’s credibility and arguments), logos (logical and valid) and pathos  (psychological / emotional appeals).

          As listeners, we have to know whether the speaker’s proposition is valid / credible / trustworthy.  Look, the speaker may be a nutritionist but he may not give sound advice.  For example, he says an egg yolk has high cholesterol and advises people not to eat an egg yolk but eat egg white only.  As listeners, we have to question the logics and validity of his arguments.  The speaker may use emotional appeals focusing on listeners’ desires, needs or values in order to gain support of his arguments. 

         

Recognising speaker’s attitude, mood and tone

          Knowing non-verbal expression of the speaker is important, too.  Attitude / mindset of the speaker  is the decisive factor to know how he delivers his speech.  And his mood is another factor that can influence what he says and how he says it.  Well, a speaker can even varies intonation, pace volume and pitch to make alive words and syntax to convey the significant points / ideas.

Knowing communication strategies

Q-words --  What | Where  |  When  |  Who  |  Whose  |  Whom  |  Which  |  Why| How |

          The listener may state his observation based on his perception and cognition.  Then he states his objectives, by expressing his stance as well as opposition and conflicting view.  At the end, he might convince the speaker to change his stand.

Identifying paralinguistic features, hesitation and redundancy

          Learners need communicative language tools like grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation as well as paralinguistic features, hesitation and redundancy to use the language in oral communicative especially.

          Paralinguistic features which include eye / head movements, eye gaze,  facial expressions, hand gestures and other body language are non-verbal communicative tools.  We sometimes need to fall on these tools to express ourselves properly.

          Very often, when we speak, we pause/hesitate to process and interpret the message.  It is natural in spoken language to pause to think what and how to say something.  We tend to use fillers like ‘ah, er, oh, ng, umm,………’ in the break while probing for idea.

          Like hesitation, redundancy is also considered a natural part of communication.  When we repeat something in different ways, we increases the chances of the message to be transmitted smoothly.  That means it increases the opportunities to be understood and well-interpreted.  Some of the examples of redundancy which you may come across  and you may not think them redundancy are such phrases like:

                   repeat again  |  two twins  |  an added bonus  |  cooking stove  |  water

                    kettle  |  water tap  |  return back  |  

Knowing the basic skills in listening, we are in the better position to get the audio message properly.  This knowledge, no doubt,  will boost our confidence to a great extent.

Reference:

The teaching of listening and speaking ESL.  OUM, Malaysia.