UWS BA ePDPs

Group and leadership

Was there a group leader?

In my group there was no clear group leader however I feel there were people who were more prominent in decision making than others.

 How was this chosen?

A leader wasn’t explicitly chosen

If informal, how did you know?  What were the actions that marked them as a leader?

People who were more prominent in the decision making made this clear as they were more confident when speaking out and shared their ideas with ease. They also were not afraid to suggest what other people within the group should do or ask for help with what they were doing.

How did this impact on the rest of the group e.g. was there some underlying resentment/ did anyone feel excluded?

I do not think anyone felt excluded or pushed out. I think we all worked together as everyone shared their opinions, even if some were more confident and forward than others. The people who were confident however did ask everyone if they were in agreement with what we did.

What was most challenging for you about working in this group? (personal reflection)

The most challenging thing for me within this group was working with people I wouldn’t normally work with. This meant trying to quickly get to know them and understand their way of working

 

Explaining

How clearly did you think the group explained to you?

I think the group explained how they built their den very clearly with the right amount of detail

What made this clear or unclear?

They had one clear leader for the talking part which meant only one person was speaking and not everyone speaking over each other. She explained the ethos they used very well and pointed out difficulties they faced when building their den. This allowed for her to share their failures and how they worked with that to re-strategise and find a solution to their problem. The spokesperson also gave opportunities for the rest of her team to jump in and put their opinion to the group which showed their great use of teamwork. They all spoke with clear voices which were easy to understand and they all spoke with confidence

What stage of the 5Ps might have been missed out?

They may have missed out the preparation stage as there wasn’t much time to prepare. They possibly had time to quickly plan who was speaking but that person won’t have had time to properly prepare.

Environment

What was the impact of the environment on your communication?

The environment can cause a lot of distraction and background noise which must be taken into consideration when communicating. It is important to keep your audience in one area where they can all see you and hear you clearly.

What changes did you make when explaining to others that you might not have considered in a typical classroom?

Volume of voice may need to be louder and clearer.

How challenging was it so speak above the sounds in the environment?  How can we make this communication easier on both speaker and listener?

It is important to keep your audience in one area where they can all see you and hear you clearly. It is important to project your voice out towards the audience. Also if there is wind it is important to consider this when positioning yourself as the noise of the wind may inhibit your audience from hearing you.

When listening, did the environment distract you? How can we overcome this?

If the audience is looking out at a busy road for example it will be easier to be distracted so the audience should face away from the distraction.

• Group and leadership
  • Was there a group leader? I would say that we all took equal roles and worked together to create our den.
  •  How was this chosen?  We all adapted and naturally ended up working together.
  • If informal, how did you know?  What were the actions that marked them as a leader?
  • How did this impact on the rest of the group e.g. was there some underlying resentment/ did anyone feel excluded? I don’t think so as we all had equal leadership roles.
  • What was most challenging for you about working in this group? (personal reflection)  I think working with new people I hadn’t worked with before was slightly difficult at first but I adapted quite easily and came out of my shell fast.
• Explaining
  • How clearly did you think the group explained to you? I think there was good explanations throughout, I didn’t struggle to understand anything.
  • What made this clear or unclear?
  • What stage of the 5Ps might have been missed out? I think our Presentation was missed out as we didn’t really discuss with other groups how our den was built and how we built it, even though we had planned accordingly.
• Environment
  • What was the impact of the environment on your communication? We mainly used our environment, we used minimal man made elements and used mainly trees and branches along with other natural materials.
  • What changes did you make when explaining to others that you might not have considered in a typical classroom? We were more informal.
  • How challenging was it so speak above the sounds in the environment?  How can we make this communication easier on both speaker and listener? We didn’t struggle as we built our den in an enclosed area, out the way of the other groups, so it was relatively quiet.
  • When listening, did the environment distract you? How can we overcome this? No, because it wasn’t very windy or loud outside.
• Negotiation
  • Were your negotiations successful?  Why/Why not? They weren’t successful as only 2 of us went to negotiate and got distracted by the other groups dens.
  • What was most challenging about these? Our negotiation skills could have definitely been improved.

The main aim of Chapter 5 :‘Finding out about others: the skill of questioning’ is to have a deeper insight into the types of questions we can ask, how we ask questions, e.g. with or without a pause, and how we respond to questions.

A few key themes within this chapter are:
– What a question is and why it is important
– Different types of questions
– The structuring of questions

A theory in this chapter that I found quite interesting in particular was the “Tunnel Sequence”, or sometimes known as a “string of beads” (Stewart and Cash, 2008). This is a type of questioning that would be very useful in an interview as the questions being asked are closed and makes it easier for the interview panel to compare several candidates’ answers as they are all responding to the same questions.

One claim I read in this chapter was from a US study: pupils will not answer questions in class because their are afraid that their fellow peers will not respond well to their responses. I agree with this claim as pupils do not want to be told that their answers are incorrect or they do not understand the context of the question in front of the class.

I did not know what the word “presuppositions” meant. A definition was provided in the chapter: “silent implications or taken for granted references” within questions. (Fiedler, 2007:15). In other words, it means to assume something beforehand.

Overall, this chapter has brought to my attention the importance of using different types of questions when communicating with pupils instead of asking only closed questions to receive one answer from them. Open questions will allow pupils to give an elaborate and detailed response.

Reference: Hargie, O. (2011) Skilled Interpersonal Communication: Research, Theory and Practice. 5th ed. London: Routledge.

I liked how you highlighted the importance of questioning for example in abuse cases where leading questions expect a certain answer. Being aware of this as future teachers to allow children to justify answers rather than almost give a desired answer or an answer that was within the question.