Today just like any other individual, a student is struggling with the problem of not being able to communicate properly. There is always a lot of mental upheaval in student life. It is very difficult to differentiate between right and wrong due to lack of experience. These days a student lifestyle is getting a little weird than before as earlier students used to enjoy studies, playing with each other, spending time with peers and playing healthy games, but now they are either engaged all the time on their phones or spend so much time on video games. This unethical use of technology is sending students far away from a healthy lifestyle and also making them introverted due to which students hesitate these days a lot to communicate and to express themselves properly. As a result, they are also getting trouble in studying as they are unable to express their issues with subjects and topics. Nowadays student life is limited to just going to school, making notes and passing. Making notes is not bad , it’s good but verbal communication and practice of good dictation is also very necessary. Students are getting far away from the podium, from the process of expressing themselves, from the process of communicating with others effectively. It has become very common that whenever students are sent to the podium to speak on any topic or to communicate to others, like mentors, they hesitate a lot or start to stammer. This lack of confidence is destroying student’s lives today.
There are many ways to improve communication between students. This needs the collaborative effort of teachers, mentors and parents also. Few methods to enhance communication skills in the students are going to be explained in this article. Firstly, it should be understood that even kids, children and students can feel just like adults so the very first step which can be taken on the basis of feelings. Children should be taught empathy so that they should learn to express and explain what’s going on in their mind. When children start getting appropriate responses in exchange of sharing their feelings then they become good listeners too which is a very important part of effective communication. Students and children should be encouraged to speak up and communicate as much as they can in class, with peers and with teachers instead of hesitating. Few students have speech problems or they stammer. Such students can get help from their mentors and peers with continuous practice of speech therapies and various activities in class which includes mutual communication such as speech giving, storytelling, poem singing etc. Extracurricular activities are organised a lot these days in schools in order to make students extrovert and to remove the phobia of facing mass from students so that they can face people while giving presentations and speeches.
Students should be taught conversation skills with practical examples and also with video examples. If students are supposed to cope up with new learning methods, suppose online learning, then they should be taught and trained to utilize these methods to enhance their skills too. These days students are taking help from a teacher app a lot to make their study full of knowledge and develop their skills too, but while using the teacher app he/she should be communicative enough to get proper education too. Best method to teach conversation skills to the students is puppet shows. Earlier it used to run on tv as daily soaps but now they can see it on cartoon channels also where they see their favourite cartoons or puppets and learn how they communicate with each other.
Students should be taught well enough about how to sit, listen, answer and ask questions to make their communication effective because if they get to learn these essential manners of communication , they can express themselves well and can learn and get responses in a good way too. In lack of good communication life becomes hell & on the other hand with good communication everything becomes easy and effective. Every language becomes prosperous due to vocabulary and correct use of vocab turns a very simple sentence also into a very effective one and people get attracted to the orator usually. So, students should also be taught good vocab to make their communication effective. For example, instead of saying to somebody, “are you stupid, can’t you speak clearly” student can use polite vocabulary like ” I beg your pardon sir, can you speak again clearly”. Such a way of communication shows manners and etiquette decorated with politeness and one gets respect each and every time he/she speaks.
A good article on how to improve students communication skills.