Thinking about listening

Today we moved away from presentations and started to look at another aspect of communication: listening.

Although we are looking at something different, the same features of communication analysis arise. We've talked a lot about structure, purpose, audience, point-of-view in relation to presentations (and in my blog PP information). Then, you were the producers of communication "texts". Now, you are not producing texts - you are "receiving" information. In this case you are receiving information aurally (ie. via your ears) in the form of radio and television programmes.

We are now interested in how other people structure a piece of communication. We're interested in working out their purpose, intended audience and point of view. When we analyse these aspects we are in a position to judge the quality of the piece.

And hopefully we learn from what is good (and not so good) about the way they've put the piece together. We should be able to apply the principles that make a good piece of oral communication (like a presentation or programme) to a piece of written communication (like an essay or report).

Students in university and college spend a lot of time listening (or should). It is one of the main, and most traditional, ways of communicating information and ideas to students. That's not to say that it's always a good way to learn. One lecturer transmitting information to a lecture theatre of 150 students may be cost-effective for a university, but does it make sense educationally? Maybe pod-casts are the way ahead?

The point is that students will do a lot of listening and we need to spend a bit of time practising that skill.

So we have now listened to the documentary on BBC Radio 4's Word of Mouth series on "borrowing" in language.

Any thoughts you have on the programme or the issue of listening always welcomed by way of feedback on the blog!

All the best,

Mark