Teaching Communication
From the very begining of our existence we communicate, first with our parents, then with our brothers and close relatives. To make us understand and / or get what we crave; We cry, we make sounds and we make gestures since we are babies.
Later, at school, we use all sorts of strategies to attract the attention of teachers and peers and we are developing countless strategies of play, coexistence and persuasion, based on communication.
Without realizing it, as we grow, we use communication to serve our interests, our needs and our concerns.
While the rest of the contents that are taught in the school will continue being used more or less, depending on the personal preferences or different careers chosen by each one, communication will always accompany us throughout our lives.
Let’s stop for a moment and analyze the current society. If we do so, we will come to the conclusion that things are not being done properly; there are many young people who write with spelling mistakes, who do not know how to express themselves adequately or who have a very poor vocabulary, and are unable to structure their ideas and transmit them to the others.
For this reason, we should analyze if we are attributing to communication the importance it deserves in classrooms, and ask ourselves how we can teach communication to our students.
We are teaching communication when we teach children to write, when we teach them to read, when we teach them to express themselves orally and in writing, when we teach them other languages, when we talk to them, when we teach them to understand and interpret what the others are expressing, when We teach them to listen to others and interact.
Let the students have all the communication tools, teach them to construct the sentences appropriately and give them the opportunity to create written productions, beyond the typical “writing about the summer”, encourage them to speak in public, etc.
Let’s not focus only on transcripts or dictations. It is important for children to discover that they can use language to “create”; make up stories, tell stories and build relationships, this will enrich their life.
