English
teachers, especially high school English teachers, use communication in more
diverse ways than arguably any other career.
They not only teach communication and persuasion; they live
communication and persuasion. Their
whole career basically revolves around communication and persuasion.
Every school day, high school
English teachers teach the finer points of communication to their students
during class. They hold conferences with students to help them with their
writing skills. They might tutor after
school as well. All of these activities require
effective communication to a specific audience of students. All students differ in personality,
motivation, engagement in class studies, and intellect. How an English teacher communicates to his or
her class is largely dependent on the students.
AP, IB, and Honors students are typically more engaged in English and
learning in general than College Prep or regular classes. While honors students might appreciate an entertaining
lesson just as much as non-honors students, honors students are typically more
able to engage even in classic lecture lessons without YouTube videos and
PowerPoints than non-honors students.
English teachers must be aware of their students’ personality in order
to communicate effectively the lesson given.
Teachers are inherently quite different from students. They are older, more mature, and in a
leadership position. These differences
sometimes make students pull away from the teacher. The English teacher must be able to highlight
the similarities between him or her and the students. The similarities are that both students and
English teachers want the student to learn about English.
In order to communicate effectively
to their students’ demographic, English teachers also need to know popular
communication techniques. Social media,
YouTube, and multi-media presentations are all extremely popular. In order to communicate effectively in the
classroom setting, the English teacher must know how to not only classically
lecture and inform but also incorporate modern communication techniques. Though most of the classroom communication is
oral, more and more English teachers are using written social media and emails
to interact quickly with their students.
They therefore use types of “e-communication” regularly. Apps and websites like Edmodo give English
teachers ways to quickly and easily communicate with students over a social
media platform.
English teachers differ greatly of
how they communicate knowledge to their students. Some feel lecturing is best. Others like back-and-forth communication,
posing questions to their students and having them answer. Written communication also occurs as English
teachers give tests and quizzes and send emails. Their communication techniques, however, all
alter with where they are communicating or persuading. They mostly communicate in their classroom,
but they also must one-on-one communicate in their offices. English teachers must be available to
communicate with during class, after class and at home using email or social
media. Large amounts of informative
communication usually occur when students email questions about large
assignments to him or her.
Therefore,
although most people assume that the teacher is usually the speaker and the
students are the audience, a lot of the time, students are speaking to the
teacher and the teacher must be the audience.
Despite the obvious fact that English teachers
use communication regularly and even teach the art of communication, what is
lesser known is the persuasion that English teachers must use. For example at least a few times a year, they
must use effective rhetoric to stave off angry parents or students upset about
a bad grade on an essay or grammar test.
Persuasion through body language and enthusiasm is often common. English teachers must make students “buy into”
their lessons. Furthermore, a few times
a year, frustrated English teachers will usually give speeches to their
students about how important English is and how they cannot relax their
engagement and attentiveness in the class.
Oftentimes, English teachers will be in direct conflict between
administrators, other departments, or even other English teachers about what is
best for the school and students or how best to spend the budget. Though all faculty wants what is best for the
students, administrators are bound by government laws and have different views
of the best way to effectively teach than English teachers might. Thus, English teachers must also be
persuasive as well as informative, though they usually persuade in dialectic
oratory. Clearly, both communication and
persuasion are vital to the high-school English teacher.
I found my information chiefly from email correspondences
with my high-school English teacher Christopher Rice.
I thought this was a great insight: "although most people assume that the teacher is usually the speaker and the students are the audience, a lot of the time, students are speaking to the teacher and the teacher must be the audience." Wow, lots of diverse kinds of speaking, and kinds of audiences, for a teacher!
ReplyDeleteYour post made me think back to some of the discussions we had in class earlier in the semester in regards to the Aristotle Rhetoric reading. We talked about how Gorgias, and the sophists in general, would sell lessons on rhetoric. When we talked about this in class, I thought it sounded a little ridiculous. But your post made me realize that we do this today. With your field of interest and even mine (communication disorders), "professionals" are paid to teach others the art of effective communication; and all of us are a product of being taught rhetoric through our school system (rhetoric is not some innate thing).
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