This semester as a co-requisite I am taking comm 104, a public speaking course, and after 2 classes I have noticed that there is a strong tie to public speaking and teaching and have found the foundational ideas to be valuable knowledge especially for an early childhood teacher. We have discussed that there are many jobs that require good leadership skills (one of which happens to be a teacher) and in order to be a leader a person needs to develop their persuasive speaking skills. If a person is not persuasive then they cannot convince people to follow their lead and believe what they are speaking about. In order to teach a child the child has to believe in their teacher, trust them, and view what they are saying as authentic. We briefly discussed the importance of eye contact, authenticity, and enthusiasm when addressing an audience. There are also three attititudes that I think a teacher should be aware in regards to the rational affect they can have on each through their teaching. These three areas are: attitude, beliefs, and values. 
Attitudes are the easiest positions a teacher can have an influence on, where students have taken a position on an idea or belief but you are not entirely certain. Most of people's attitudes are based on little evidence and more so on a few experiences. A position that is a little more difficult to influence are a student's beliefs which are formed from attitudes that the child has held for a long time and which have been reinforced through experience. It is at the these level of beliefs that we start to distinguish cultures from one another. And lastly the most difficult level or position to change in a student are their values, which are their long enduring beliefs that have become a major part of who they are. Parents and even grandparents affect children's values and raise them a certain way, reinforcing ideas on a daily basis, and therefore it is not a teacher's role to try and change such values but instead to open their students' attitudes up to different beliefs and values. I found that this ties into the reading I have done thus far in the Delpit book. Like in the Delpit book, in public speaking we have discussed tendencies to develop biases due to our beliefs and values of our culture. In both my my EDEE courses and public speaking course, their is an emphasis on looking at things through someone else's eyes, whether it be the students or the audience (and in many cases it is both). Lastly, I found part of our discussion on Thursday in comm 104 to be helpful knowledge, where the professor laid out for us the "cues of influence" or the order of how we influence people we are trying to persuade or convince of an idea. In order from first to last these steps include:
1. Comparison (similarities between them and the speaker makes it easier for them to be convinced).
2. liking (do they like the person who is speaking/trying to persuade them).
3. authority (the greater the authority the speaker has over them the easier they are persuaded-parallel to the "power" discussed in the Delpit book).
4. Commitment and Consistency (the speaker must be confident and they, themselves, must believe what they are saying).
5. Scarcity (the more scarce something is the more a person wants it and it becomes more valuable).
Lastly it is important to know that when speaking we not only do so verbally but through our body language. We communicate even stronger messages which affect our audience more so than the words we are saying. In some cases people may give off two messages, making their point less authentic and causing the audience to question them. Children are likely to pick up on their teacher's body language. So, just something to beware of.
Last, for my public speaking class we each took a typography test to help our professor understand our biological tendencies which affect how we communicate. I think it is important for a teacher to understand both themselves and how they communicate and also how their students communicate. This might even be a great way to assess your students or get to know them better in the beginning of the year if they have a form of this test designed more for young children (not sure if they do?). Here is the link:
Very informative. The connection between public speaking and education is a strong one. I found the information you shared on the "cues of influence" to be very interesting. Often children can sense a teacher's level of commitment to them and it makes a big difference in terms of whether that child respects the teacher or not.
ReplyDeleteI'll have to check out the link you provided. Thanks for sharing it.