Session 1 - Lesson, Communication basics

Our first lesson was about how to Manage our Mouths. We first read James 3, the whole chapter, to refresh us of what the Biblical principle was to managing what we say. This Scripture talks about how our little tongues control what happens to the whole body in the same way that a small rudder controls a ship, a bridle controls a horse, or a small flame starts a huge fire.

I was the lesson teacher on this Saturday and drew from my education of communications classes. I used a presentation software to create presentation slides and audience handouts and described the basics of communication.

The root word of communication is "common" and implies that the people communicating have a common understanding. Communication starts with at least two people. One person wants to send a message and that person is the Sender. The Receiver is the person who the message is directed towards. Communication can be created using words, symbols, body language and tone of voice.


SENDER ->>>>> Message ->>>>> RECEIVER

Each message's content is created by the Sender's knowledge based on their own frame of reference, experience, culture, word usage, values and ability to listen. The Receiver of course has her own basis of frame of reference, experience, culture, word usage, values and ability to listen. Depending on whether the knowledge of the two women are similar, they message may not be understood. So, the Receiver has to confirm that she understood what the message was about by repeating what she understood. The Receiver then becomes a sender in the exchange that occurs.

RECEIVER ->>>>> Confirming Message ->>>>> SENDER
(sender) ->>>>> Confirming Message ->>>>> (receiver)

This is often times the piece that is missing. Communicating is really a cycle of several exchanges between invididuals. Take an example between a husband and wife. The wife asks her husband to find the aqua colored vase in the basement and bring it upstairs. If the husband has not had much luck in finding anything his wife previously asked for from the basement, his eyes may simply glaze over and suddenly he doesn't hear a thing. As soon as he hears "find the", he stops listening. (Yes, I sense that you may have had this experience too). Or, if his mental picture of an aqua vase consists of something green, then, he has not clearly understood the request. Therefore, some type of feedback is needed from the husband.

When I am on the receiving side, I have gotten in the habit of saying "let me repeat what I am hearing, just to make sure I understood you right". This way, I'm sure I got the message.

You can imagine that if the message is being sent to a group of people, the potential for miscommunicating is increased exponentially since they all have their own frame of reference, experience, culture, word usage, values and various abilities to listen. Therefore, feedback from all is essential to confirm that everyone got the same meaning from the message. This makes group communication more difficult and time consuming.

This basic communications lesson was simple but a nice reminder to all that when we miscommunicate, we may have missed an important part of the process. Reviewing the process also confirmed the method in which we were going to communicate during these monthly gatherings.