Competent Communication

Welcome one and all to the seventh of ten courses in my journeys towards my Master's Degree in Early Childhood Studies. This week I began my seventh course at Walden, Communicating and Collaborating in the Early Childhood Field. For our first blog assignment, we are to ponder the learning about communication from this week and consider someone we know in our lives who is a competent communicator. It can be a colleague, friend, family member, celebrity, teacher, etc. Once we think of an individual to use as an example, we must share the following: who is the person that you perceive to be a competent communicator, behaviors this person exhibits to make them effective, and whether or not you would model your own communication behaviors after this person and why. Instantly, two people came to mind when I thought about this assignment so I will briefly discuss both individuals below.

Upon considering this topic, the first person that came to mind was my mother. My mom is an Assistant Manager for the Payroll Department of a company in Center City, Philadelphia. She has worked for the company for 28 years and takes on much more responsibility than an assistant manager should or normally would because she is great at her job and is dedicated to doing what is right. She lives by the code of ethics and morals and communicates very effectively with colleagues, employees, employers, and clients all over the country and world. Even though it can be extremely frustrating, she always finds the right way to communicate with the individual to help them resolve their issues or answer their questions appropriately and effectively. She maintains professionalism in all conversations and endeavors in the work place, even when she wants to deep down lose her cool. She makes everyone she works with feel at ease and helps anyone as much as she possibly can. I learned so much about my mother in her workplace as I worked with her for a few years when I first started my job experiences from age 16-21 as a file clerk in her office. I admire my mother for a variety of reasons, but her work ethic, dedication, demeanor, and attitude are behaviors I attempt to utilize in my own career endeavors. Despite the fact that our fields of work are different, there are still ways to implement the same traits and behaviors into my own communications with others in my work place. The rapport my mother has with her colleagues, employers, and clients is something I truly admire and aspire to have in my own career.

The second person who came to mind was my first grade teacher and recent fourth grade colleague who retired this year. Carol B. is a remarkable individual and educator with a dedication and passion for educating children that cannot be compared. I am lucky to share that she was not only my first grade teacher and inspiration for becoming a teacher, but also my colleague in the fourth grade for three wonderful years. I consider her to be one of my mentors, without officially having that title. In terms of communication, she always has the most professional and eloquent ways of speaking to others, whether it be the children, colleagues, administrators, or parents and families. Whenever faced with a difficult situation involving a parent, I would seek her for advice or ask her to review my response before sending as I respected her competency in terms of ethical conduct and ethical communication. Similar to my mom, she developed an instant rapport with the children and families, as well as administration. She entered a room and instantly earned respect of those around her for simply being effective in her communication skills and doing her job well. She spoke on behalf of educators and staff in our district as a Union representative on the Negotiations team and was very well versed in her speaking abilities. I admire Carol more than words can express and would be honored if I could be an ounce like her in terms of my communication skills in education and overall as an educator in this field in general.

That's all for now…until next week! :)