Communication Skills: Language,
Nonverbal, Listening
I watched the television show “Modern
Family “ with the sound off for the first several minutes then I turned the
sound up and compared what I thought I was observing without sound to watching
the show with the sound turned up.
There was a dark haired man sitting on the couch moving his hands and
looks like he is explaining something. A
lady is talking to a boy that looks like he is around 12 years old. A blond- haired guy is on a playground but
looks like he has a flashback to something that has occurred earlier. In the next scene a heavyset guy is talking
to a lady with blond hair and they appear to be arguing and the guy rushes into
the house.
Now
with the sound turned up on the show, an older man is taking care of a baby and
he put a liquor bottle up to his mouth and drinks the liquid. The
heavy set guy reappears and says that he has to prove a dispute with Claire. The
older man decides to take the baby to the movie theater and the baby starts
crying, so a lady in the movie theater offers to take the baby out of the movie
theater. The scene goes back to the
playground area and the blond-haired guy asks a little boy to teach him how to
play a children’s game using a ball because his little daughter has been
bullied by this particular little boy. A
woman named Gloria caught the guy (who is actually her husband) without the
baby but he is holding the baby’s blanket.
The father says he doesn’t understand why his wife is so mad, but his son
(the 12 year old boy) tells him that maybe she is mad because he gave the baby
away to a complete stranger.
This
experiment made me realize the importance of verbal communication. When I was watching the show without sound I
had some idea of what the people were feeling by looking at facial expressions
and body language, But when the sound
was turned up it opened up a whole new world of understanding. Listening is more important than speaking in
order to get the full picture of what is actually happening. This exercise forced me depend solely on my
visual and listening skills and now I am
going to take the time to really listen to people before I speak in order to
give my undivided attention and respect to the speaker.
Nikki,
ReplyDeleteI have watched an episode of this show due to a colleague at work recommending the show. It is a relatable show to today's culture. It show's a blended family of American and Spanish culture. It's a show filled with relatable comedy. I think listening is very important as well
Hi Nikki,
ReplyDeleteI have watched several episodes of the show you mentioned. This was a good show to do this experiment on, as I believe all the characters are very "colorful." It is true, verbal communication is very important to go along with nonverbal communications in order to support full understanding of each relationship and their wants and needs. Thanks for your post.
Nikki
ReplyDeleteI have never watched this show but after reading your post I may tune in one day. This was a very interesting assignment. Nonverbal communication is very important when communicating with others. Often actions speak louder than words. I really enjoyed your post.
This was a very interesting assignment as it separated our listening and observing skills allowing us to focus on one and then the other rather than both simultaneously as we typically do. It was interesting to see that body language and facial expressions did not always relay the message that we had assumed that it did. Listening to the person speak then gave new meaning to what we thought we had observed.
ReplyDelete